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Exonerate   Listen
verb
Exonerate  v. t.  (past & past part. exonerated; pres. part. exonerating)  
1.
To unload; to disburden; to discharge. (Obs.) "All exonerate themselves into one common duct."
2.
To relieve, in a moral sense, as of a charge, obligation, or load of blame resting on one; to clear of something that lies upon oppresses one, as an accusation or imputation; as, to exonerate one's self from blame, or from the charge of avarice.
3.
To discharge from duty or obligation, as a bail.
Synonyms: To absolve; acquit; exculpate. See Absolve.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Exonerate" Quotes from Famous Books



... operations. All the ignorance of a genuine panic is there. There were no well-informed unbelievers there to tear off the veil, nor better-informed Christians to remove it, not even so much as a Wesley to exonerate God by saying, "I am constrained to believe that it is the devil tearing them as they are coming to Christ." No! There is one conviction at Cane Ridge—it is this: Jehovah is here. It was a wonderful panic—a wonderful time. Persons going on to ...
— The Christian Foundation, May, 1880

... brought into court at all? How did Sir Arthur Inglewood, or rather his client, know that William Kershaw had on those two memorable occasions visited the hotel, and that its landlord could bring such convincing evidence forward that would for ever exonerate the millionaire from the imputation ...
— The Old Man in the Corner • Baroness Orczy

... commensurate to the other objects for which the public faith stands now pledged. Allow me, moreover, to hope that it will be a favorite policy with you, not merely to secure a payment of the interest of the debt funded, but as far and as fast as the growing resources of the country will permit to exonerate it of the principal itself. The appropriation you have made of the Western land explains your dispositions on this subject, and I am persuaded that the sooner that valuable fund can be made to contribute, along with the other means, to the actual reduction of the public debt the more salutary will ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... taxed at 3d. per pound, or 30 per cent., under the Customs Union, while in the Republic it is subject only to the 7-1/2 ad valorem duty. Coffee and other necessaries of life, on being compared, would show a similar difference, and this Government therefore trusts that Her Majesty's Government will exonerate it when it points out the incorrectness and unreliability of the information supplied to the Secretary of State, on which he bases his conclusion that the cost of living is unusually high in consequence of the taxation levied ...
— A Century of Wrong • F. W. Reitz

... matter of Mr. Hazlitt's communication: as to the manner, I am sorry that it is liable to a construction which perhaps was not intended. Mr. Hazlitt says—'I do not wish to bring any charge of plagiarism in this case;' words which are better fitted to express his own forbearance, than to exonerate me from the dishonour of such an act. But I am unwilling to suppose that Mr. Hazlitt has designedly given this negative form to his words. He says also—'as I have been a good deal abused for my scepticism on that subject, I do not feel quite disposed that any one else should run ...
— The Uncollected Writings of Thomas de Quincey—Vol. 1 - With a Preface and Annotations by James Hogg • Thomas de Quincey

... engagement every sovereign power has a right to recede. But it has been shown that in this sense the States are not sovereign, and that even if they were, and the national Constitution had been formed by compact, there would be no right in any one State to exonerate itself ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, - Vol. 2, Part 3, Andrew Jackson, 1st term • Edited by James D. Richardson

... conveniently introduce him, it is curious, however, that they never do, except in cases of moral evil. Criminal indictments charge prisoners with acting wickedly under the instigation of the Devil. But physical evil is ascribed to Jehovah. Bills of lading exonerate shipowners from liability if anything happens to the cargo through "the act of God or the Queen's enemies." Old Nick does not raise storms, stir up volcanoes, stimulate earthquakes, blight crops, or spread pestilence. All those destructive pastimes are affected by his rival. Even cases ...
— Flowers of Freethought - (Second Series) • George W. Foote

... have said on the subject of education may give a handle to persons who delight in misrepresenting the opinions of others, to accuse me of republican principles; I will, therefore, say a few words on this subject, which I trust will exonerate me from ...
— Life in the Clearings versus the Bush • Susanna Moodie

... him an order to support Davoust. This order has never been produced, and it finds no place in the latest and fullest collection of French official despatches, which, however, contains some that fully exonerate Bernadotte.[111] Unfortunately for Bernadotte's fame, the tattle of memoir writers is more attractive and gains more currency than the ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose

... Russia at a moment when troubles seemed to be clearing away. In his Preface to Vol. VII. he had three objects, to set right the position of Sir E. Hamley, who had been neglected in the despatches; to demolish his friend Lord Bury, who had "questioned my omniscience" in the "Edinburgh Review"; and to exonerate England at large from absurd self-congratulations about the "little Egypt affair," the blame of such exaggeration resting with those whom he ...
— Biographical Study of A. W. Kinglake • Rev. W. Tuckwell

... myself; his incurable, irresponsible childishness was as clear to me then as it was on his deathbed, his redeeming and excusing imaginative silliness. Through some odd mental twist perhaps I was disposed to exonerate him even at the cost of blaming my poor old mother who had left things ...
— Tono Bungay • H. G. Wells

... against the door with a groan, Tess catching her breath in a sob. She could not exonerate herself because of Teola; she knew from Frederick's emotion at Ben's assertion that his sister had not told him. But he should not believe the lie that ...
— Tess of the Storm Country • Grace Miller White

... subject of the exchange of prisoners, appeared to be widespread, and the apparent hopeless nature of the negotiations for some general exchange of prisoners appeared to be a cause of universal regret and deep and injurious despondency. I heard some of the prisoners go so far as to exonerate the Confederate Government from any charge of intentionally subjecting them to a protracted confinement, with its necessary and unavoidable sufferings, in a country cut off from all intercourse with foreign nations, and sorely pressed on all sides, whilst on the other hand they charged ...
— Andersonville, complete • John McElroy

... each claims to have been the victim of the robbery, then he is to part the stolen property (or the value of it) among them all, and go his way. So says Rabbi Tarphon, but Rabbi Akiva argues that the defaulter does not in this way fully exonerate himself; he must restore to each and all the full value ...
— Hebraic Literature; Translations from the Talmud, Midrashim and - Kabbala • Various

... rendered the speedy and successful result of the long-established policy of the Government upon the subject of Indian affairs entirely certain. The occasion is therefore deemed a proper one to place this policy in such a point of view as will exonerate the Government of the United States from the undeserved reproach which has been cast upon it through several successive Administrations. That a mixed occupancy of the same territory by the white and red man is incompatible with the safety or happiness of either is a position in respect ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 2 (of 2) of Volume 3: Martin Van Buren • James D. Richardson

... 'the poor child's story, faithfully repeated to these men, will be sufficient to exonerate him.' ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens

... light will not use it because they are unwilling to recognize the selfishness that is at the root of their trouble. Some women like to call it "shyness," because the name sounds well, and seems to exonerate them from any responsibility with regard to their defect. Men will rarely speak of their self-consciousness, but, when they do, they are apt to speak of it with more or less indignation and self-pity, as if they were in the clutches of something extraneous to themselves, and over which ...
— The Freedom of Life • Annie Payson Call

... let me exonerate Harold from the charge of intemperance, pointing out that not even after the injury and operation, nor after yesterday's cold and fatigue, had he touched any liquor; but I don't think the notion of teetotalism was gratifying, even when I called it a private, individual vow. Nor ...
— My Young Alcides - A Faded Photograph • Charlotte M. Yonge

... persons "alleged to be Germans." The case involving the Indians was reported to the joint committee of Congress on the Conduct of the Present War;[70] but at least one piece of evidence was not, at that time, forthcoming, a piece that, in a certain sense, might be taken to exonerate the whites. It came to the knowledge of General Blunt during the summer and was the Indians' own confession. It bore only indirectly upon the actual atrocities but showed that the red men were quite equal to making their own plans in fighting and were not to be relied upon to do ...
— The American Indian as Participant in the Civil War • Annie Heloise Abel

... from whom I have already quoted, 'to describe the intense sorrow in view of separation. Mr. Patteson did all he could to assure us that it was his own will and act, consequent upon the conviction that it was God's will that he should go, and to exonerate the Bishop, but for some time he was regarded as the immediate cause of our loss; and he never knew half the hard things said of him by the same people who, when they heard he was coming, and would preach on the Sunday, did their utmost to make themselves and ...
— Life of John Coleridge Patteson • Charlotte M. Yonge

... not be denied, but as the links in the chain had been broken in several places, he considered that the whole had fallen to pieces, and he confessed that he did not believe for a moment, from the facts before him, that Howard was guilty. From his knowledge of Digby he must fully exonerate him from the charge of willfully implicating his friend in the matter, as it seemed evident that he was justified in expressing the suspicions he entertained, considering the circumstances of the case. ...
— St. Nicholas, Vol. 5, No. 5, March, 1878 • Various

... southern man and that I was after that woman, it would have been doubtful about my ever getting home and that it would have taken three hundred Michigan troops to have gotten us out of Windsor, dead or alive. But I do say to exonerate those colored people from all suspicion, in the affair, that, some time after, the watch was found, nicely wrapped up in a piece of cloth and in a bureau drawer, where it had been laid away ...
— The Bark Covered House • William Nowlin

... Locrians, a Greek people settled in Lower Italy, and who flourished in 700th century B.C.; had a supreme respect for law, and was severe in the enforcement of it; punished adultery with the forfeiture of sight; refused to exonerate his own son who had been guilty of the offence, but submitted to the loss of one of his own eyes instead of exacting the full penalty of the culprit; had established a law forbidding any one to enter the Senate-house armed; did so himself ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... daughter, and listen to me. I have kept nothing from you a day longer than necessary. The facts that exonerate the Duke of Hereward came to me last of all. Hear me. From Father Garbennetti, the new cure of San Vito, I learned the truth of that miscalled elopement of the late Duchess of Hereward. I learned that—in the words ...
— The Lost Lady of Lone • E.D.E.N. Southworth

... murderer, and influenced by this fear, took the sudden resolution of profiting by all the points which the two women had in common by acknowledging, what everybody had expected him to acknowledge from the first, that the woman at the Morgue was his wife. This would exonerate her, rid him of any apprehension he may have entertained of her ever returning to be a disgrace to him, and would (and perhaps this thought influenced him most, for who can understand such men or the passions that sway them) insure the object of his late devotion a ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green

... to sift with a view of picking out the worst{220}. 'Polite' is another word which in the figurative sense has quite extinguished the literal. We still speak of 'polished' surfaces; but not any more, with Cudworth, of "polite bodies, as looking glasses". Neither do we now 'exonerate' a ship (Burton); nor 'stigmatize', at least otherwise than figuratively, a 'malefactor' (the same); nor 'corroborate' ...
— English Past and Present • Richard Chenevix Trench

... in a few days," he remarked; "and I trust I shall be able to exonerate myself from the absurd charges which may be brought against me. The very fact that I had assumed a civilised costume, proves that I was about to return to the settlement. Had I been captured dressed as a hunter, at the head of a party of blacks or Indians, my conduct might have ...
— In the Wilds of Florida - A Tale of Warfare and Hunting • W.H.G. Kingston

... nobly, Dr. Grant, I believe in your religion now. Forgive me that I ever doubted it. I exonerate you from blame." ...
— Family Pride - Or, Purified by Suffering • Mary J. Holmes

... countries which, in the opinion of the Boer, is altogether too progressive. It is, of course, a pity that the Englishman cannot accommodate himself to the antiquated ideas of the Boer, because if he could, he would probably exonerate himself in the Dutch eyes, and at the same time find himself away back in the eighteenth century. But in this advanced age he is too much for the Boer, and this is probably the explanation of the ...
— The Boer in Peace and War • Arthur M. Mann

... have him sent to jail. If she discovers that he is getting the affection and the sex life which she has denied him, outside of his home, and if she buys a revolver and murders him in cold blood, the jury will exonerate her. ...
— Women As Sex Vendors - or, Why Women Are Conservative (Being a View of the Economic - Status of Woman) • R. B. Tobias

... dice, perhaps—but there was no other way. Danglar, and those with him, were at the bottom of the crime of which she was held guilty. She could not go on as she had been doing, merely in the hope of stumbling upon some clew that would serve to exonerate her. There was not time enough for that. Danglar's trap set for herself and the Adventurer last night in old Nicky Viner's room proved that. And the fact that the woman who had originally masqueraded as Gypsy Nan—as she, Rhoda Gray, was ...
— The White Moll • Frank L. Packard

... 'Whilst I exonerate myself from all share in having divulged opinions hostile to existing sanctions, under the form, whatever it may be, which they assume in this poem, it is scarcely necessary for me to protest against the system of inculcating the truth ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Volume I • Percy Bysshe Shelley

... had done was justified to his own conscience, but he did not seek to dispute that it was unjustifiable in military law. True, had all been told, it was possible enough that his judges would exonerate him morally, even if they condemned him legally; his act would be seen blameless as a man's, even while still punishable as a soldier's; but to purchase immunity for himself at the cost of bringing the fairness of her ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]

... collapsed and vanished from his mind. He admitted to himself that driven by a kind of instinctive necessity he had led their conversation step by step to a realization and declaration of love, and that it did not exonerate him in the least that Miss Grammont had been quite ready and willing to help him and meet him half way. She wanted love as a woman does, more than a man does, and he had steadily presented himself as a man free to love, able to love ...
— The Secret Places of the Heart • H. G. Wells

... told the landlord plainly myself, that the English seldom objected to pay liberally, but hated extortion. The charge of two francs a day for attendance is a snare and a delusion, for it is well known that this does not in the least exonerate one from feeing the waiter, chambermaid, porter, boots, and even the omnibus tout. It is a system of blackmail throughout, and I think something should be done to abolish it, for it is undoubtedly one of the greatest drawbacks to foreign ...
— Fair Italy, the Riviera and Monte Carlo • W. Cope Devereux

... disgrace of inaction and the anxiety of suspense. Unable to ascertain the details of the accusation, and conscious of his own secret, he was debarred the last resort of demanding a court-martial, which he knew could only exonerate him by the exposure of the guilt of his wife, whom he still hoped had safely escaped. His division commander, in active operations in the field, had no time to help him at Washington. Elbowed aside by greedy contractors, forestalled by selfish ...
— Clarence • Bret Harte

... blame the blameless, as the poet says; for I am myself being dragged along by reason, until you bring up some other reason to release me from durance. And here is reason about to talk more masterfully still, you will see; but I suppose you will exonerate it, ...
— Works, V2 • Lucian of Samosata

... But what her duty was regarding reporting the leaders in the "racket," if they obstinately refrained from confessing their offense, she could not readily determine. She finally resolved that she would do her utmost to exonerate Jennie without incriminating anyone else, ...
— Katherine's Sheaves • Mrs. Georgie Sheldon

... want nothing, except to do my duty; but you'll have to exonerate yourselves, and I have just advised Mrs. Protsova, and I advise you also, not to try to hide what everyone can see, but to say what really happened. Especially as Mr. Protsov is in such a condition that he has already told everything just as it happened, and will probably do the same ...
— The Live Corpse • Leo Tolstoy

... agree to assume all the claims of their citizens against the Mexican Republic which may have arisen under treaty or the law of nations since the date of the signature of the treaty of Guadalupe, and the Mexican Republic agrees to exonerate the United States of America from all claims of Mexico or Mexican citizens which may have arisen under treaty or the law of nations since the date of the treaty of Guadalupe, so that each Government, in the most formal and effective manner, shall be exempted and exonerated of all ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 4) of Volume 5: Franklin Pierce • James D. Richardson

... of a girl under thirteen is a misdemeanour. Her consent makes no difference, and even the solicitation of the act on the part of the child will not exonerate the accused. ...
— Aids to Forensic Medicine and Toxicology • W. G. Aitchison Robertson

... is overwhelming, I grant," bowing deferentially. "But I return to my first idea, that Puritan blood was not exactly fit to engender genius; and that in the rich, careless Southern nature there lurks a vein of undeveloped song that shall yet exonerate America from the charge of poverty of genius, brought by the haughty Briton! Yes, we will sing yet a mightier strain than has ever been poured since the time of Shakespeare! and in that good time coming weave a grander heroic poem than any since the days of Homer! Then men's souls shall ...
— Sea and Shore - A Sequel to "Miriam's Memoirs" • Mrs. Catharine A. Warfield

... this confession in my prison cell, of my own free will, and without coercion from any one; partly because I know that the evidence concerning my share in the Vrain conspiracy is strong against me, and partly because I wish to exonerate my daughter Lydia. ...
— The Silent House • Fergus Hume

... is!" gasped Fanny, on the theory that an expression of bewilderment on her part would exonerate her ...
— Bought and Paid For - From the Play of George Broadhurst • Arthur Hornblow

... 29. Nothing in these rules shall exonerate any vessel or the owner or master or crew thereof from the consequences of any neglect to carry lights or signals, or of any neglect to keep a proper lookout, or of the neglect of any precaution which may be required by the ordinary practice of seamen or ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Volume 8, Section 2 (of 2): Grover Cleveland • Grover Cleveland

... lay the conviction that if she would please God, she must avoid the sin of Saul. Saul had spared the Amalekites, and God had turned his face from him. God had greater enemies in England than the Amalekites. Historians have affected to exonerate Pole from the crime of the Marian persecution; although, without the legate's sanction, not a bishop in England could have raised a finger, not a bishop's court could have been opened {p.223} to try a single heretic. If not with Pole, with whom did ...
— The Reign of Mary Tudor • James Anthony Froude

... consciously perceived by those who are parties to it, that we cannot be too cautious of suffering our hatred of libel to involve every casual libeller, or of suffering our general respect for the person of the libeller to exonerate him from the charge of libelling. Many libels are written in this little world of ours unconsciously, and under many motives. Perhaps we said that before, but no matter. Sometimes a gloomy fellow, with a murderous ...
— The Posthumous Works of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. 1 (2 vols) • Thomas De Quincey

... next afternoon, which, was the 3d of April, everything was ready for me. The Doctor showed me in his stores-tent a sober suit of gray clothes, not military clothes, but of a cut that might deceive the eye at a distance, yet when closer seen would exonerate the wearer from any suspicion that he was seriously offering ...
— Who Goes There? • Blackwood Ketcham Benson

... never pamper one appetite or gratify one lust; and that, in compliance with the exhortation of Christ, you "take no thought for the morrow." This is a case of so extreme a nature that its occurrence seems a bare possibility, and will not surely exonerate those who, if they are but scantily supplied in comparison with the ample abundance which enriches the condition of others, have nevertheless the means of a sufficient and perhaps a comfortable support. From those who possess ...
— Female Scripture Biographies, Vol. II • Francis Augustus Cox

... the days drag by that the girl had grown to believe that the authorities would never bring Lafe to trial, exonerate him, and send him home. Then, too, Theodore was still in the hospital, and she thought of him ever with a sense of terrific loss. But the daily papers brought her news of him, and now printed that his splendid constitution might pull him through. It never ...
— Rose O'Paradise • Grace Miller White

... I was down here. Thank you, Mr. Dawson, for the information you have so kindly and honestly given me. It takes me back two and a-half years in the history of my lady's life; but I have still a blank of three years to fill up before I can exonerate her from ...
— Lady Audley's Secret • Mary Elizabeth Braddon

... of Bentley, in following out his hypothesis, does not exonerate us from bearing in mind so much truth as that hypothesis really must have had, from the pitiable difficulties of ...
— The Notebook of an English Opium-Eater • Thomas de Quincey

... Koosje," said the old gentleman, sedately, "that you will exonerate me from any such proceeding. If you remember rightly, I was altogether against your plan for keeping her in the house." He could not resist giving her that little dig, kind ...
— Stories By English Authors: Germany • Various

... that will be no fault of ours; and if he lands them, they can be no evidence against us at any time, for they have not seen our brig, and Signor Sandro will not dare to give any correct information, though, of course, he will tell a number of lies to exonerate himself; but for that we are not to blame. Now we will heave to, to windward of our friend, and see the boat clear for launching, to carry me and ...
— The Pirate of the Mediterranean - A Tale of the Sea • W.H.G. Kingston

... purpose. By the word "sufficient" we are not to understand that this divine monitor calls upon men every day or hour, but that it is within every man, and that it awakens him seasonably, and so often during the term of his natural life, as to exonerate God from the charge of condemning him unjustly, if he fails in his duty, and as to leave himself without excuse. And in proportion as a greater or less measure of this spirit has been afforded him, so he is more or less guilty in the sight ...
— A Portraiture of Quakerism, Volume II (of 3) • Thomas Clarkson

... a fragment: "If he springs his alarm, here in the moonlight, you can be here, Spawn, and pretend to try and rescue him. A radio-image of that flashed to Hanley's office will exonerate us ...
— Astounding Stories of Super-Science, October, 1930 • Various

... konsumiteco. Exhibit elmontri. Exhibition ekspozicio. Exhort admoni. Exhume elterigi. Exigence postulo—eco. Exigent postula. Exile ekzili. Exist ekzisti. Existence ekzistajxo. Exit eliro. Exonerate pravigi. Exorbitant supermezura. Exotic alilanda. Expanse etendeco. Expand etendi. Expect atendi. Expectation atendo. Expectorate kracxi. Expedite ekspedi. Expedition (milit.) militiro. Expeditious ...
— English-Esperanto Dictionary • John Charles O'Connor and Charles Frederic Hayes

... us, till we have clearly seen that this mode of government is radically defective. Is it not indeed absurd to take a certain number of men from out the mass, and to entrust them with the management of all public affairs, saying to them, "Attend to these matters, we exonerate ourselves from the task by laying it upon you: it is for you to make laws on all manner of subjects—armaments and mad dogs, observatories and chimneys, instruction and street-sweeping: arrange these things as you please and make laws about them, since you are the chosen ones whom the ...
— The Place of Anarchism in Socialistic Evolution - An Address Delivered in Paris • Pierre Kropotkin

... did he assume deep mourning if calamity came in consequence thereof. A few appropriate words of compliment addressed mainly to himself for his care in having the ship, when she sailed, in a state of unimpeachable order, and his constant intercession for divine protection were quite sufficient to exonerate him from in any way contributing either to loss of life or to loss of property. What cant, what insufferable hypocrisy! What hideous slaughter was committed in those good old times in God's name and in the name of British humanity! ...
— The Shellback's Progress - In the Nineteenth Century • Walter Runciman

... the Monastic orders (in anything approaching to the Romanist sense of the term) without previous communication with me—or indeed that you should take upon yourself to originate any measure of importance without authority from the heads of the Church—and therefore I at once exonerate you from the accusation brought against you by the newspaper I have quoted, but I feel it nevertheless a duty to my Diocese and myself, as well as to you, to ask you to put it in my power to contradict what, if uncontradicted, would appear to imply a glaring invasion of all ecclesiastical discipline ...
— Apologia pro Vita Sua • John Henry Newman

... Her manner seemed too ingenuous for guilt. Yet where could that ruby be, if not with this young girl? Certainly, all other possibilities had been exhausted, and her story of the bill, even if accepted, would never quite exonerate her from secret suspicion while ...
— Room Number 3 - and Other Detective Stories • Anna Katharine Green

... No. 3 have had a difficulty. No. 3 having failed to serve the vent, there was a premature explosion, and No. 1, being about to withdraw the rammer, fell heavily to the ground, apparently dead. No. 3, seeing what a calamity he had caused, hung over the dead man and begged him to speak and exonerate him from blame. After No. 3 had exhausted all his eloquence and pathos, No. 1 suddenly rose to his feet and informed him that the premature explosion was a fact, but the death of No. 1 was a joke intended to warn him that if he ever failed again to serve that vent, he would have his ...
— Detailed Minutiae of Soldier life in the Army of Northern Virginia, 1861-1865 • Carlton McCarthy

... promptly, from the foot of the bed. "I was prowling all around somewhere about four, searching"—he glanced at me—"for a drink of water. But as I don't know a pearl from a glass bead, I hope you exonerate me." ...
— When a Man Marries • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... said island and came to this city with the fleet and troops which he had there, in the month of April of the year 98. The said Don Francisco Tello and the said Doctor Morga, seeing the great error which they had committed, attempted to exonerate themselves before the said Don Joan Rronquillo should arrive in this city. They arrested him, charging him with having taken away the protection of the said island of Mindanao, without their having sent him any strict order which would ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume XI, 1599-1602 • Various

... instead of being restricted to the choice between undertaking a work certain to prove pernicious and abstaining from it, he was free to select a third course and to accomplish it in such a way that the result would not be evil, but unmixed good. In this case it would hardly seem possible to exonerate the doer from a charge of wanton malice, diabolic in degree. And such is the position in which many theologians seem—to those who view things in the light of reason—to have placed God Himself. It was open to Him, they ...
— The Sceptics of the Old Testament: Job - Koheleth - Agur • Emile Joseph Dillon

... a risk in attending. He recognized that. But he was moved by an imperative urge to find out all that was possible of the affair. The force that drove him was the need in his heart to exonerate his friend. Though he recognized the weight of evidence against her, he could not believe her guilty. Under tremendous provocation it might be in character for her to have shot his uncle in self-defense or while in extreme anger. But all his knowledge of her cried ...
— Tangled Trails - A Western Detective Story • William MacLeod Raine

... above subject in "N. & Q.," I admit that my meaning may have taken too wide a signification. I, however, wrote advisedly, my object being to draw the attention of those schools that were in fault, and in the hope of benefiting those that desired to do more. I suppose I must exonerate Tonbridge, therefore, from any aspersion; and as it appears they are well provided, from Bacon and Newton to Punch and the Family Friend, I am at a loss to know how I can be ...
— Notes and Queries, Number 218, December 31, 1853 • Various

... interview, she being under the impression that she was simply having a friendly gossip with a neighbour. Our representative, however, is sure he explained to Mrs. Meadows that his visit was official; and, in any case, our duty to the public must be held to exonerate us from all blame in ...
— Malvina of Brittany • Jerome K. Jerome

... words, something said to Lydia that it was not her business to decide whether or not the Indians deserved to live. It was her business to recognize that in their method of killing the Indians, the whites had been utterly dishonorable. That her refusing to take a stand could not exonerate them. History would not fail to record the black fact against her race that, a free people, the boasted vanguard of human liberty, Americans had first made a race dependent, then by fraud and faithlessness, by cruelty and debauchery, were utterly destroying it. And finally, that by closing ...
— Lydia of the Pines • Honore Willsie Morrow

... a bachelor, answerable only to yourself, you cannot understand how absence does not exonerate me from the promise made when she started away. I would sooner face an 'army with banners,' than that little brown-eyed woman of mine when she takes the lapel of my coat in one hand, raises the forefinger of the other, ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson

... on behalf of that Academy, a subscription greater than a few individuals had expended, and were still ready and desirous of contributing thereto; and suggest it to your Committee, that if out of the monies due from the County of Northumberland to the State a sufficient sum was granted to exonerate the Academy from debt, no more would be wanted in the future to effect the purposes of that institution, than a sum equal in amount to the value of the library proposed to be furnished by Dr. Priestley; such value to ...
— Priestley in America - 1794-1804 • Edgar F. Smith

... needed no pleading to induce her to exonerate Joseph. The doctors were present at Frowenfeld's in more than usual number. There was unusualness, too, in their manner and their talk. They were not entirely free from the excitement of the day, and as they talked—with an air of superiority, ...
— The Grandissimes • George Washington Cable

... I should have some hope of the innocence of young Robin if it should turn out that his father, Sir Duncan, has destroyed a good many of the native race in India. It may reasonably be hoped that he has done so, which would tend very strongly to exonerate his son. But the evidence laid before your Worship and ...
— Mary Anerley • R. D. Blackmore

... fully accept the statements of the Secretary of State for the Colonies, and of the Under-Secretary, and entirely exonerate the officials of the Colonial Office of having been in any sense cognisant of the plans which led up to the incursion of Dr. Jameson's force ...
— The War in South Africa - Its Cause and Conduct • Arthur Conan Doyle

... exonerate Edwin Brigham of cheating in the poker game in Hampden Scarborough's rooms on Saturday evening, February 20, 18—. And we pledge ourselves never to speak of the matter either to each other ...
— The Cost • David Graham Phillips

... fellow say that he "professed nothing and lived up to it;" but "professing nothing" does not exonerate a man at all, so far as relates to the personal maintenance of honor, purity, and truth. The man who would excuse a lapse from virtue, or any obliquity of conduct, on the ground that he did not profess any thing, simply announces to me the execrable proposition that every ...
— Lessons in Life - A Series of Familiar Essays • Timothy Titcomb

... me; yet I did not like to go without first having a difficulty with him. Much as I disliked my condition, I was ignorant enough to think that something besides the fact that I was a slave was necessary to exonerate me from blame in running away. A cross word, a blow, a good fright, anything, would do, it mattered not whence nor how it came. I told my brother Charles, who shared my confidence, to be ready; for ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 17, No. 100, February, 1866 • Various

... was his friend's rejoinder. "I may do no better; but I should be less than a man if I did not make an effort to wipe out the disgrace as soon as possible. No reflection on you, Graham. Your wounds exonerate you; and I know you did not ...
— His Sombre Rivals • E. P. Roe

... deeply affected by what he had just heard. It was evident that Colonel Forrester had, with a generosity to which no gratitude of his own could render adequate justice, sought to exonerate him from all suspicion of participation in the guilty design upon his life, and as he glanced his eye again for a moment upon the lifeless form of his companion, he was at once sensible that the only being who could defeat ...
— The Canadian Brothers - or The Prophecy Fulfilled • John Richardson

... false notes on the piano, and that my calling was that of a retail grocer, this opinion would offer, to my thinking, a greater degree of probability. Evidently, in my double character of citizen and musician, I am not even to exonerate myself from the fault you [ascribe] to me. Suffer me then not to dwell longer upon it, and deign for the future to spare me the pain which all suspicion of ...
— Letters of Franz Liszt, Volume 2: "From Rome to the End" • Franz Liszt; letters collected by La Mara and translated

... determined to send the Abbas down with an Arab captain. Herbin asked to be allowed to go. I jumped at his offer. Then Stewart said he would go if I would exonerate him from deserting me. I said, 'You do not desert me. I cannot go; but if you go you do great service.' I then wrote him an official; he wanted me to write him an order. I said 'No; for, though I ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume II • Demetrius Charles Boulger

... door and called after her down the piazza, trying to exonerate the Captain: but she either did not or would not hear, and vanished into the ...
— Birthright - A Novel • T.S. Stribling

... things were not so bad as that, he did not see how he was to exonerate himself from another charge; a minor one, indeed, but one which might make him look very black in some people's eyes. He had known of Dino's claims for many weeks, as well as of Brian's existence. ...
— Under False Pretences - A Novel • Adeline Sergeant

... I owe allegiance to a man who so treated me. I don't deny that he had excuses. The common standards exonerate him; but, good heavens, a sense of humour, if nothing else, ought to save him from making this grotesque claim on his victim! To preach the duties of wife and mother to me!" Hadria broke into a ...
— The Daughters of Danaus • Mona Caird

... was a lady of such rank that I might have been her servant. But though I conceal her name, I would not have you suppose that she was in any wise culpable, however manifest and avowed her fault may appear to have been. The story I will now briefly relate to you will completely exonerate her memory. ...
— The Exemplary Novels of Cervantes • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

... greatest compliment you could pay to your good opinion of my candour, to print and circulate that or any other work, attacking me in a manly manner, and without any malicious intention, from which, as far as I have seen, I must exonerate this writer. ...
— Life of Lord Byron, Vol. III - With His Letters and Journals • Thomas Moore

... well-expressed thanks for all that Mr. Fellowes had done for him, and for kindness for which he hoped to be the better all his life. He enclosed a long letter to his father, which he said would, he hoped, entirely exonerate his kind and much-respected tutor from any remissness or any participation in the scheme which he had thought it better on all accounts to conceal ...
— A Reputed Changeling • Charlotte M. Yonge

... him into their employ," said Charlie. "Captain Stride tells me he has been in their service for more than a quarter of a century, and they exonerate him from all blame in the loss of the brig. It does seem odd to me, however, that he should be appointed so immediately to a new ship, but, as you remarked, that's none of my business. Come, I'll go in with you and congratulate your mother and ...
— Charlie to the Rescue • R.M. Ballantyne

... ease; popularize; lighten, lighten the labor; free, clear; disencumber, disembarrass, disentangle, disengage; deobstruct^, unclog, extricate, unravel; untie the knot, cut the knot; disburden, unload, exonerate, emancipate, free from, deoppilate^; humor &c (aid) 707; lubricate &c 332; relieve &c 834. leave a hole to creep out of, leave a loophole, leave the matter open; give the reins to, give full play, give full swing; make way for; open the door to, open the way, prepare the ...
— Roget's Thesaurus of English Words and Phrases: Body • Roget

... ferment, lead to violent manifestations and declarations, and to many people being obliged to pledge themselves to measures of a dangerous tendency. He wishes, therefore, to place Peel in such a situation as shall exonerate him from the necessity of a dissolution, by giving him a fair general though independent support; but the power to do this depends much upon the temper that is displayed, and upon the mode in which the change is effected; for if the Tories cannot be restrained from the exhibition ...
— The Greville Memoirs (Second Part) - A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 - (Volume 1 of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville

... they took too much credit it was only natural. But not an item of what is their due should be taken from them. The world must be grateful to whoever took a part in so noble a deed. At the same time the world will not exonerate the two official contracting parties from being exactly free from interested motives. The one desired to maintain domestic harmony, and this could only be assured by recalling the days of their nation's glory; and the other, i.e., the British Government, had their ...
— The Tragedy of St. Helena • Walter Runciman

... warlike acclamations of those who exonerate themselves from the impost of blood, or who find in public misfortunes a source of new speculations, we protest,—we who wish for ...
— The Duel Between France and Germany • Charles Sumner

... under state organization is usually expressed in the following words: "As a man, I pity him; but as guard, judge, general, governor, tzar, or soldier, it is my duty to kill or torture him." Just as though there were some positions conferred and recognized, which would exonerate us from the obligations laid on each of us by the ...
— The Kingdom of God is within you • Leo Tolstoy

... more especially the look he gave me when he went away. It was not an impudent look—I exonerate him from that—it was a look of reverential, tender adoration. Ha, ha! he's not quite such a stupid blockhead ...
— Agnes Grey • Anne Bronte

... convince the public that the tragedy which happened three days later was the result of a deliberately matured conspiracy to murder the citizens for revenge, there is nothing whereon to base such a charge; on the contrary, the evidence tends to exonerate the troops, and the verdicts show the opinion of the juries. There was exasperation on both sides, but the rabble were not restrained by discipline, and on the night of the 5th of March James Crawford swore he he saw at Calf's ...
— The Emancipation of Massachusetts • Brooks Adams

... 1637 the Bishop of Bath and Wells sent Joice Hunniman to Lord Wrottesley to examine her and exonerate her. He did so, and the bishop wrote thanking him and abusing "certain apparitors who go about frightening the people." See Hist. MSS. Comm. Reports, II, app., p. 48. For a case of the acquittal of a witch and the exposure of the pretended convulsions of her ...
— A History of Witchcraft in England from 1558 to 1718 • Wallace Notestein

... Grimalkin?—and what is that relation in life when compared to the rapport established between the living bard and the fellow-creature who is disposed to cater to his caterwauling appetite for publicity? However, to be serious, I must at least exonerate the bard, I am sure, from any desire to appropriate an "interest in the proceeds." There are some, I feel certain, to whom the collector might say with a wink, "What are you going ...
— Recollections of Dante Gabriel Rossetti - 1883 • T. Hall Caine

... house we went, Nannie trudged laboriously up to the top, and I heard her murmuring, "Night, day," as she went backward and forward, from one room to the other. At last we found a small house in Chelsea of which she thoroughly approved. She couldn't exonerate the agent from all blame in saying that there were views of the river from the window. "Not but what there might be if we, leaned out far enough, but we can't because of the bars." It was the very bars that had attracted her in the first instance, from the outside. ...
— The Professional Aunt • Mary C.E. Wemyss

... hopeless job to try to exonerate himself. "Yes, there were reasons—I couldn't help it, in fact. But I'm afraid I should not be able to make ...
— Maurice Guest • Henry Handel Richardson

... that because there was something in it Trumbull did not perceive, that something did not exist. More than this, is it true that what Trumbull did can have any effect on what Douglas did? Suppose Trumbull had been in the plot with these other men, would that let Douglas out of it? Would it exonerate Douglas that Trumbull did n't then perceive he was in the plot? He also asks the question: Why did n't Trumbull propose to amend the bill, if he thought it needed any amendment? Why, I believe that everything ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln

... at her solemn face and voice. "If you'll exonerate yourself first," he answered: "I couldn't touch a morsel that conveyed confession of the least culpability on your part. Do you consent? Otherwise, I pass this dish. And ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... on the pavement. I was immediately surrounded by myrmidons, who I doubt not were on the watch for me. Indeed, I was in no situation to escape, for I had sprained my ankle in the fall, and could not stand. I was seized as a housebreaker; and to exonerate myself from a greater crime I had to accuse myself of a less. I made known who I was, and why I came there. Alas! the varlets knew it already, and were only amusing themselves at my expense. My perfidious muse had been playing me one of her slippery tricks. The old curmudgeon of a father had ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving

... is very anxious that all this good weather should not be wasted in inactivity. Telegraph when you will move and on what lines you propose to march." This dispatch was plainly a notice to McClellan that he would be held responsible for the failure to obey the order of the 6th unless he could exonerate himself by showing that he could not obey it. In his final report, however, he says that he treated it as authority to decide for himself whether or not it was possible to move with safety to the army; [Footnote: Ibid.] "and this responsibility," he says, "I exercised with the more ...
— Military Reminiscences of the Civil War V1 • Jacob Dolson Cox

... I, monsieur," he answered, as if anxious to exonerate himself, although he knew not to whom he was talking. "It was my comrade. He said he knew the woman, and that the governor would wish her instantly admitted, and he opened the gate. When she came in, I would have had her wait at the gate till M. de la ...
— An Enemy To The King • Robert Neilson Stephens

... the Times. After an hour and thirty-five minutes of delay the verdict was a compromise: "We are unanimously of opinion that the book in question is calculated to deprave public morals, but at the same time we entirely exonerate the defendants from any corrupt motive in publishing it." The Lord Chief Justice looked troubled, and said that he should have to translate the verdict into one of guilty, and on that some of the jury turned to leave the ...
— Annie Besant - An Autobiography • Annie Besant

... clarify; explain, interpret, elucidate, eclaircise; acquit, absolve, exonerate, vindicate; disengage, extricate, ...
— Putnam's Word Book • Louis A. Flemming

... retained one atom of my self-possession I would never have dreamed of approaching the little European vessel at the head of a whole flotilla of catamarans, filled with yelling and gesticulating savages. As to the people on board the vessel, I exonerated them then, and I exonerate them now, from all blame. Had you or I been on board, we should probably have done exactly the same thing under ...
— The Adventures of Louis de Rougemont - as told by Himself • Louis de Rougemont

... exonerate himself. "I hope she didn't feel left out;" he said. "I did notice that she wasn't talking. I found her in the garden, alone—she seemed to be enjoying that, too—and she and I went about for quite a long ...
— Tante • Anne Douglas Sedgwick

... "I exonerate you," said the baronet, "from censure, and exempt you from loss. I have been swindled. There is now no remedy. So make me another suit, and by stricter vigilance, we shall endeavour ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan

... right, Apostolical succession, and similar pretensions. Yet if they did not so furiously engage themselves in actual witch-prosecutions, Anglican divines have not been slow in expressly or impliedly affirming the reality of diabolical interposition. Nor can the most favourable criticism exonerate them from the reproach at least of having witnessed without protestation the barbarous cruelties practised in the name of heaven; and the eminent names of Bishop Jewell, the great apologist of the English Church, and of the author ...
— The Superstitions of Witchcraft • Howard Williams

... long, resonant hammering upon a dry limb or stub. It is Downy beating a reveille to Spring. In the utter stillness and amid the rigid forms we listen with pleasure, and as it comes to my ear oftener at this season than at any other, I freely exonerate the author of it from the imputation of any gastronomic motives, and credit him with a genuine ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 91, May, 1865 • Various

... Narbonne succumbed in this struggle, and his dismissal involved the disorganization of the ministry. The Girondists threw the blame upon Bertrand de Moleville and Delessart; the former had the address to exonerate himself; but the latter was brought before the high ...
— History of the French Revolution from 1789 to 1814 • F. A. M. Mignet

... his feet, his face pale with excitement which easily passed for virtuous indignation. "Do you fancy I would stoop to exonerate myself from such a charge? Since when has the testimony of servants been received in a club ...
— The Philistines • Arlo Bates

... 1862, recruiting was stopped dead; the central recruiting office at Washington was closed and its staff dispersed. Many writers agree in charging this error against Stanton. He must have been the prime author of it, but this does not exonerate Lincoln. It was no departmental matter, but a matter of supreme policy. Lincoln's knowledge of human nature and his appreciation of the larger bearings of every question might have been expected to set Stanton right, unless, ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood

... to give way before it? This had so touched her that it might almost be said that she knew not to which of her two suitors her heart belonged. All this, if stated in answer to Mrs Baggett's accusations, would certainly exonerate herself from the stigma thrown upon her, but to Mrs Baggett she ...
— An Old Man's Love • Anthony Trollope

... profession, and his favourite project to reform the laws, a task for which he fancies himself eminently qualified. To accomplish any particular object he cares not to what charges of partial inconsistency he exposes himself, trusting to his own ingenuity to exonerate himself from them afterwards. Neither O'Connell nor Shiel are supposed to be men of courage, but Lawless is, and he is thought capable of the most desperate adventures. Shiel is of opinion that the Association might be suppressed by law; O'Connell thinks it could not, and that if it might ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William - IV, Volume 1 (of 3) • Charles C. F. Greville

... 'I thought it right to answer his letter, as I could exonerate the missionaries from any charge of having attempted to prejudice us against the Roman Catholic priests, nor did I believe that they would make use of any unfair argument against their faith, founded on the political position of the pope.' I must also express my conviction that the ...
— The Cruise of the Mary Rose - Here and There in the Pacific • William H. G. Kingston

... head, so that I cannot see beyond, and was named Sassol Mascheroni:[5] if thou art Tuscan, well knowest thou now who he was. And that thou mayst not put me to more speech, know that I was Camicion de' Pazzi,[6] and I await Carlino that he may exonerate me." ...
— The Divine Comedy, Volume 1, Hell [The Inferno] • Dante Alighieri

... to Sir Reginald Glanville will explain my reasons for not keeping my pledge: suffice it to state to you, that they are such as wholly to exonerate me, and fairly to satisfy Sir Reginald. It will be useless to call upon me; I leave town before you will receive this. Respect for myself obliges me to add that, although there are circumstances to forbid my meeting Sir Reginald Glanville, there are none to prevent my ...
— Pelham, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... are in a horrible state. The latest disclosures of the great defalcations seem to involve so many officials and non-officials, and break out in so many new directions, that one does not know whom to exonerate. The King and most of the ministers—quantities of officials, persons in high social positions and unblemished reputation—seem to have been carried away by the fever; Comoundouros himself is accused of participation; —— and ...
— The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume II • William James Stillman

... have it stamped, not on events so fugitive as those of war and peace, liable to oblivion or eclipse, but on the permanent relations of its integral parts. In a still larger proportion I believe his motive to have been one of pure convenience, the wish to exonerate himself from the intolerable vexation of a double parliament. In a government such as ours, so care-laden at any rate, it is certainly most harassing to have the task of soliciting a measure by management and influence twice over—two trials to organize, two storms of anxiety to face, ...
— Autobiographic Sketches • Thomas de Quincey

... authority.[474] Indeed, by a recent holding, district courts of the United States are bound to entertain suits for damages arising out of alleged violation of plaintiff's constitutional rights, even though as the law now stands the Court is powerless to award damages.[475] But Congress may, in certain cases, exonerate the officer by a so-called act of indemnity,[476] while as the law stands at present, any officer of the United States who is charged with a crime under the laws of a State for an act done under the authority of the United ...
— The Constitution of the United States of America: Analysis and Interpretation • Edward Corwin

... exonerate Surajah Dowlah from the shame and stain of that deed. The savage who passed "the word of a soldier" that the lives of his prisoners should be spared took no precautions to insure the carrying out of his promise. If, as Mr. Holwell says, ...
— A History of the Four Georges, Volume II (of 4) • Justin McCarthy

... I have searched their boxes had they not insisted. But they were all so afraid of being accused, that they wished to exonerate themselves as much as possible. The fact that the whole four were in the kitchen together at the time the crime was committed quite clears them. However, they insisted, so I looked into their boxes. I found this ...
— The Secret Passage • Fergus Hume

... of Prelacy? What the Christian, in the presence of systems in imperial politics which have already dethroned Christ and are hastening to expel Him from all national institutions? Is there no means by which the Christian citizen can exonerate himself from national sins, and free himself of all responsibility for national calamity? Must he still exercise his right to vote and give his support to governments which, in the hands of both political parties, are augmenting rather than diminishing the existing evils? If ...
— The Covenants And The Covenanters - Covenants, Sermons, and Documents of the Covenanted Reformation • Various

... injuring Brown, bent its energies to saving Macdonald from the consequences of his reckless violence. The Liberal members asked for a complete exoneration of Mr. Brown. A supporter of the government was willing to exonerate Brown if Macdonald were allowed to escape without censure. A majority of the committee, however, took refuge in a rambling deliverance, which was sharply attacked in the legislature. Sir Allan MacNab bluntly declared ...
— George Brown • John Lewis

... degradation and subordination were made a necessity. If, however, we accept the Darwinian theory, that the race has been a gradual growth from the lower to a higher form of life, and that the story of the fall is a myth, we can exonerate the snake, emancipate the woman, and reconstruct a more rational religion for the nineteenth century, and thus escape all the perplexities of the Jewish mythology as of no more importance than those of the Greek, ...
— The Woman's Bible. • Elizabeth Cady Stanton

... Stixwould had no scruples in so encroaching upon the waters of the Witham and diverting its course, that the vessels accustomed to ply on it with turf and faggots for the people of Lincoln, could now only do so at great peril. {154e} We may, perhaps, however, exonerate the “Lady Superior” and her nuns from all blame in this matter, when we remember that there was a “Master of the Nuns” {154f} and other male officials who, indeed, battened on the Priory in such numbers, that ...
— Records of Woodhall Spa and Neighbourhood - Historical, Anecdotal, Physiographical, and Archaeological, with Other Matter • J. Conway Walter

... I do this, I shall exonerate the first Quakers from the charge of such a depreciation. These exhibited in their own persons the practicability of the union of knowledge and virtue. While they were eminent for their learning, ...
— A Portraiture of Quakerism, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Clarkson

... intent look which had more or less sustained me through this ordeal, remained fixed upon my face as though he were still anxious to see me exonerate myself. How much did he know? That was the question. How much ...
— The House of the Whispering Pines • Anna Katharine Green

... say, 'His lordship is very early this morning,' and after that, drive away just as hard as the old car can take you. I'm in the mood to have some fun to-night, and whatever I do is no responsibility of yours, so don't you be troubled about it, my lad. I shall exonerate you if there's any tale; but there can't be one, for surely a man may drive through his own park when he has ...
— The Man Who Drove the Car • Max Pemberton

... not calculated to foster the pride of an old man to plunge into a relation of dubious doings of his youth. And yet, as I look backward on that one bit of smuggling of which I was guilty, so far as motive was involved, I exonerate myself. I looked on the government, because of the South's conquest by the North, and that later ruin of myself through the machinations of the Revenue office, as both a political and a personal foe. And I felt, not alone morally free, but was impelled besides in what ...
— The Onlooker, Volume 1, Part 2 • Various

... and talked a good deal of ——. I endeavoured to excite sympathy for the unhappy person, but failed in the attempt. The unfortunate generally meet with more blame than pity; for as the latter is a painful emotion, people endeavour to exonerate themselves from its indulgence, by trying to discover some error which may have led to the misfortune they are too selfish to commiserate. Alas! there are but few friends who, like ivy, cling to ruin, and —— is not one ...
— The Idler in France • Marguerite Gardiner

... for some time that the partners were on the watch for the thief. He had heard them talking about the matter; but he supposed he had managed the case so well as to exonerate himself and implicate Harry, whom he hated for ...
— Try Again - or, the Trials and Triumphs of Harry West. A Story for Young Folks • Oliver Optic

... gratified in my words. Vanity has been my curse, and even now it hurts me to humiliate myself to you all, so much so, that, though I pity a man who has wrongfully suffered condemnation through me for many years, I would not exonerate him were it not at the command of the church. Twelve years ago I was a young bride, and with my husband, an officer high in rank in our army, was at London. I was called pretty; I know I was worldly, foolish and vain. My husband, a very superior ...
— A Heart-Song of To-day • Annie Gregg Savigny

... but as a narrator of events of which I was an EYEWITNESS, I felt bound to tell the truth, although that truth might impugn the historical accuracy of a work which ranks as a classic in the language. At the same time I entirely exonerate Mr. Irving from any intention of prejudicing the minds of his readers, as he doubtless had only in view to support the character of his friend: that sentiment is worthy of a generous heart, but it should not be gratified, nor would he wish to gratify it, ...
— Narrative of a Voyage to the Northwest Coast of America in the years 1811, 1812, 1813, and 1814 or the First American Settlement on the Pacific • Gabriel Franchere

... obliged to explain, exonerate, expostulate, and neutralize before the French Cabinet his famous Dayton letter. I was sure it was to come to this; Mr. Thouvenel politely protested, and Mr. Seward confessed that it was written for the American market (alias, for bunkum). All this will make a very unfavorable impression upon ...
— Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862 • Adam Gurowski

... where emotion is extreme The power to give and take flattery to any amount What a stock of axioms young people have handy When Love is hurt, it is self-love that requires the opiate Wrapped in the comfort of his cowardice You accuse or you exonerate—Nobody can ...
— Quotations from the Works of George Meredith • David Widger

... of 1916 he was one of a delegation which visited England, France, and Italy. On his return to Russia, through Stockholm, he there met and held a conversation with a German agent, but at the time, though the matter was taken up by the Duma for investigation, he managed to exonerate himself. But, as became known, the incident caused him to attract the attention of Rasputin, and he and the court favorite came together and to an understanding. The result was ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume VI (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various

... confess yourself in the wrong, and exonerate Mr. Totten. In any other event the case will have to come to trial before a court-martial, and you, Mr. Crane, since we are certain that you possess material evidence, will be forced to appear as ...
— Dave Darrin's Third Year at Annapolis - Leaders of the Second Class Midshipmen • H. Irving Hancock

... sitting on a jury with their own troopers, or to believe that within three days a change had taken place in Claverhouse's position of which there is no record either in his own letters or in any other existing document, we must accept Wodrow's narrative as the true one, and exonerate Claverhouse from all responsibility for the deaths of Gillies and ...
— Claverhouse • Mowbray Morris

... exonerate the English doctor and the captain of the schooner from all participation in his attempt. They had met on the high seas quite by accident, and finding how carefully the prison of his august master was watched, ...
— The Ocean Cat's Paw - The Story of a Strange Cruise • George Manville Fenn

... out long afterward. And dimly I remembered, in thinking of Loria as he had looked in that dreadful hour, that he had worn a coat and hat like Maxime's. How can I tell what were the details of his scheme? But when Maxime was accused of the murder, and Loria made no effort to exonerate him, it took all my faith in the Marchese as a lover to believe that he was sacrificing his friend wholly for my sake. As for me—why should I give myself up to the guillotine for a man who would have betrayed me for an Olive Sinclair—especially ...
— The Castle Of The Shadows • Alice Muriel Williamson

... expenditure bestows. They know too well the pain of want of money, but have never learned that the real pleasure of its possession consists in its employment.[66] It is only from habit, only from perverted experience, that they are avaricious, therefore I at once exonerate them from the charges I have brought against those whose very nature it is to love money for its own sake. At the same time the strong expressions I have made use of respecting these latter, may, ...
— The Young Lady's Mentor - A Guide to the Formation of Character. In a Series of Letters to Her Unknown Friends • A Lady

... indulgence or dissipation in such a consecrated life. It is a matter between the individual and his conscience or his doctor or his social understanding what exactly he may do or not do, what he may eat or drink or so forth, upon any occasion. Nothing can exonerate him from doing his utmost to determine and perform the right act. Nothing can excuse his failure to do so. But what is here being insisted upon is that none of these things has immediately to do with ...
— God The Invisible King • Herbert George Wells

... merely to exonerate myself before God and man. Heaven is my witness, that I never knew I had a child in America until to-night, that until to-night I believed you were in California living as the wife of that base villain Peterson, who wrote announcing himself your ...
— Infelice • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson

... his own declared sense of the evident intent and obligation thereof.—That in the month of June, 1780, the said Warren Hastings made to the Council what he called "a very unusual tender, by offering to exonerate the Company from the expense of a particular measure, and to take it upon himself; declaring that he had already deposited two lacs of rupees [or twenty-three thousand pounds] in the hands of the Company's sub-treasurer for that service." That in a subsequent letter, dated the 29th of November, ...
— The Works Of The Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IX. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... estopped from disputing the banker's right to debit him with the amount (Vagliano v. Bank of England [1891], A.C. 107; McKenzie v. British Linen Co. 6 A.C. 82; Ewing v. Dominion Bank [1904], A.C. 806). The doctrine of the fictitious person as payee may also exonerate a banker who has paid an order bill to a wrongful possessor. Payment on a forgery to an innocent holder is payment under mistake of fact; but the ordinary right of the payor to recover money so paid is subordinated to the necessity ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 3 - "Banks" to "Bassoon" • Various

... as if to exonerate herself from the inward charge of being too easily put off. "Withdrawn because he saw ...
— Tales Of Men And Ghosts • Edith Wharton

... he uttered, when the faggots were piled around him, would seem to exonerate him from such a charge: "My God, whom I have so often offended, be merciful to me; and I beseech you, O Virgin Mother, and you, divine Stephen, to intercede with God for me a sinner." The Parliament of Paris condemned his works as containing "damnable, pernicious, and heretical ...
— Books Fatal to Their Authors • P. H. Ditchfield

... again urged, this time with a touch of command in my voice. "This is a serious matter, and I intend to deal with it as it deserves. You once said that if you knew anything which might serve to exonerate Eleanore Leavenworth from the suspicion under which she stands, you would be ready ...
— The Leavenworth Case • Anna Katharine Green

... serious intention, I know how to be occasionally merry. The critical reviewers charged me with an attempt at humor. John having been more celebrated upon the score of humor than most pieces that have appeared in modern days, may serve to exonerate me from the imputation; but in this article I am entirely under your judgment, and mean to be set down by it. All these together will make an octavo like the last. I should have told you that the piece which now employs me is rime. I do not intend to write any more blank. It is more difficult ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IV (of X)—Great Britain and Ireland II • Various

... that the high-spirited girl had condemned him. He felt himself in a false position from which he could not easily extricate himself. The worst of it was that if it came to a showdown he could not expect the simple truth to exonerate him. ...
— A Texas Ranger • William MacLeod Raine

... They neither exonerate, dung, piss, nor spit in that island; but, to make amends, they belch, fizzle, funk, and give tail-shots in abundance. They are troubled with all manner of distempers; and, indeed, all distempers are engendered and proceed from ventosities, as Hippocrates demonstrates, lib. ...
— Gargantua and Pantagruel, Complete. • Francois Rabelais

... de Banyan rose twenty-five per cent in his estimation at the utterance of those words, however injurious they were in the opinion of him who had spoken them. There was hope for the captain; and Somers trusted that he would be able fully to exonerate himself from the foul charge, when the occasion should permit such ...
— The Young Lieutenant - or, The Adventures of an Army Officer • Oliver Optic

... After all that was seen by others? Impossible, my dear Hamilton!" exclaimed Trevannion. "You cannot exonerate him without criminating others." ...
— Louis' School Days - A Story for Boys • E. J. May

... body of Christ is sometimes given to those suspected of crime in order to put them to proof. Because we read in the Decretals: "It often happens that thefts are perpetrated in monasteries of monks; wherefore we command that when the brethren have to exonerate themselves of such acts, that the abbot shall celebrate Mass, or someone else deputed by him, in the presence of the community; and so, when the Mass is over, all shall communicate under these words: 'May the body of Christ prove thee today.'" ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas

... at Rome, among many others that spoke against the Fabii, the priests called fecials were the most decided, who, on the religious ground, urged the senate that they should lay the whole guilt and penalty of the fact upon him that committed it, and so exonerate the rest. These fecials Numa Pompilius, the mildest and justest of kings, constituted guardians of peace, and the judges and determiners of all causes by which war may justifiably be made. The senate referring the whole matter to the people, and the priests there, as well ...
— Plutarch's Lives • A.H. Clough

... and a respect for his feelings. He explained that his partner was then absent on an enterprise of importance, and that it particularly behoved himself publicly to accept the blame of what he had rashly done, and publicly to exonerate his partner from all participation in the responsibility of it, lest the successful conduct of that enterprise should be endangered by the slightest suspicion wrongly attaching to his partner's honour ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens

... written while fresh from "conversion," and is speaking for the first time the language of a Christian and a Catholic. The supernatural element of her memoirs it is not worth while to discuss. Were she otherwise worthy of credit, we might exonerate her personal veracity by assuming that she was tricked over the apparition and hallucinated in the vision that followed it, but I propose submitting to my readers sufficient evidence to justify a conclusion that she does not deserve our credit, and though out of deference ...
— Devil-Worship in France - or The Question of Lucifer • Arthur Edward Waite



Words linked to "Exonerate" :   exculpate, whitewash, clear, convict, evaluate, exonerative, exoneration, discharge, label, vindicate, judge, acquit, pronounce, purge, pass judgment



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