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Be active   /bi ˈæktɪv/   Listen
Be active

verb
1.
Be in a state of action.  Synonym: move.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Be active" Quotes from Famous Books



... when General Sherman began to move toward Memphis. Thinking there would be active work at Vicksburg, I prepared to go to Columbus by rail, and take a steamboat thence to Memphis. By this route it was nearly four hundred miles; but it was safer and more expeditious to travel in that way than to attempt the "overland" journey of fifty ...
— Camp-Fire and Cotton-Field • Thomas W. Knox

... he said, "but I feel that I must bring the matter up again. As a scout and leader of irregulars for the Confederacy. I must be active in order to cope with the enemy's own scouts and spies. I shall return ...
— The Rock of Chickamauga • Joseph A. Altsheler

... recovered the name with relief. "Mr. Hugh Crimble—that's it!—whom you so amazingly caused to be present, and apparently invited to be active, at a business ...
— The Outcry • Henry James

... your guard, with respect to Mons. Penet, as not to deviate from the original contract made with him, as we cannot learn that he is known to be a person of substance, at the same time it is but justice to say, that he appears to be active, industrious, and attentive to your interests. He is indeed connected with a very good house in Nantes, M. Gruel, but we know not the terms of that connexion, or how far M. Gruel is answerable. It seems to us, that those houses, which ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. I • Various

... one, waist deep. "This is but a little stream, but if there are larger ones, as is like enough, we shall have to swim before we are done. There is one advantage; in such weather as this, even the Welsh will scarce be active." ...
— Both Sides the Border - A Tale of Hotspur and Glendower • G. A. Henty

... not only the living from day to day that made one anxious, it was the Future!" (Lady Maria knew that the word began in this case with a capital letter.) "No one knows what the Future is to poor women. One knows that one must get older, and one may not keep well, and if one could not be active and in good spirits, if one could not run about on errands, and things fell off, what could one do? It takes hard work, Lady Maria, to keep up even the tiniest nice little room and the plainest presentable wardrobe, if one isn't clever. ...
— Emily Fox-Seton - Being The Making of a Marchioness and The Methods of Lady Walderhurst • Frances Hodgson Burnett

... shall learn how the invisible fairy sunbeams have been buy here also; how last year's snowdrop plant caught them and stored them up in it's bulb, and how now in the spring, as soon as warmth and moisture creep down into the earth, these little imprisoned sun-waves begin to be active, stirring up the matter in the bulb, and making it swell and burst upwards till it sends out a little shoot through the surface of the soil. Then the sun-waves above-ground take up the work, and form green granules in the tiny leaves, helping ...
— The Fairy-Land of Science • Arabella B. Buckley

... complete, leaving orders with the officers to follow as soon as they should have enlisted men sufficient to make up their companies. "The season of the year," added he, "calls for despatch. I depend upon your usual diligence and spirit to encourage your people to be active on ...
— The Life of George Washington, Volume I • Washington Irving

... the service of God, not by caprice, but according to his law,—commanding to vow, and finding those who enter into covenant bound by his authority through their own deed. Let us not be undecided. There is duty incumbent on us which we cannot devolve on others. Let us be active, lest even the tide of liberalism, like a refluent wave, bring society back to a sea of trouble, before the glorious work of Covenanting which will be performed in future times will be begun, and we who should have used direct means to lead to it will be dishonoured. That some ...
— The Ordinance of Covenanting • John Cunningham

... pretend as if you expected ten dollars for each song. This money must be used to take up Saccault's note, which is due the fifteenth. Take the address of the holder, and pay it before it is protested. You will be allowed till the next day to pay it. Be active in this matter, and let me hear how things turn out. I cannot, in reason, in my present situation, take a room at a rent of a hundred and twenty dollars a year.[E] We have cares enough for the present; therefore let us not sow ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 12, No. 74, December, 1863 • Various

... be active and thankful that he had been unbound before his captors went away, leaving him a prisoner in the shanty until they were ready to release him. Joe Durgan had even been considerate enough to leave a half loaf ...
— The Boy Scouts on Picket Duty • Robert Shaler

... will not—yet good Night. [Exit King, and all but Philip's Party. Well, Friends, I see the King will sleep away his Anger, And tamely see us murder'd by this Moor; But I'll be active, Boys— Therefore, Antonio, you command the Horse; Get what more Numbers to our Cause you can: 'Tis a good Cause, and will advance our Credit. We will awake this King out of his Lethargy of Love, And make him absolute—Go to your Charge, And early in the Morning I'll be with you— ...
— The Works of Aphra Behn, Vol. II • Aphra Behn

... nowadays about the Americanization of the foreigner; but the only thing that will do the thing is to work with the foreigner, as I worked with Magnus—let him help me, and be active in helping him. The Americanization motto is, "Look upon the foreigner as an equal. Help him. Let him help you. Make each other's problems mutual problems—and then he is no longer a foreigner." When Magnus Thorkelson came back on foot across the prairie ...
— Vandemark's Folly • Herbert Quick

... (frosted turnip tops and other vegetables), and from the growths of certain molds in fodder (musty hay, mow-burnt hay, moldy oats, moldy bread, etc.). Finally, alkaline waters and alkaline incrustations on the soil may be active causes. In some of these cases the result is beneficial rather than injurious, as when cattle affected with gravel in the kidneys are entirely freed from this condition by a run at grass, or by an exclusive ...
— Special Report on Diseases of Cattle • U.S. Department of Agriculture

... only two kinds of people that interest Ernestine. Those who'll be active in carrying on the propaganda, and those who ...
— The Convert • Elizabeth Robins

... causes of poverty and dependence in order that the student may see that such causes are very complex, and, as we have already said, there rarely exists a dependent family in which three or more of these causes are not found to be active. Certain questions arise from such a brief presentation as this which we may mention but cannot hope adequately to deal with. Such, for example, is the question whether the subjective causes of poverty can all be reduced to objective causes. ...
— Sociology and Modern Social Problems • Charles A. Ellwood

... child is "to move freely, and be active, to grasp and hold with his own hands." He is to stand "when he can sit erect and draw himself up," not to walk till he "can creep, rise freely, maintain his balance and proceed by his own effort." He is ...
— The Child Under Eight • E.R. Murray and Henrietta Brown Smith

... beginning to appreciate the reason for this evolutionary process. We have discovered that the cause depends upon certain active changes which take place in the sex organs. About this time the testicles begin to be active. For years these glands have been preparing themselves for this work, so they first grow rapidly, increasing in size until they are about eight times bigger than they were before this time, then they begin to pour into the ...
— The Eugenic Marriage, Vol 2 (of 4) - A Personal Guide to the New Science of Better Living and Better Babies • W. Grant Hague

... to buy, unless the person making the statement is in the business of giving information on stocks, because it may be only a rumor with no substantial basis. Of course, if many people act on the rumor, there will be active trading in the stock, and it is frequently for that purpose that such ...
— Successful Stock Speculation • John James Butler

... must see much more danger than in my life I have seen, or than others will venture seriously to affirm that they see, in the Pope aforesaid, (though a foreign power, and with his long tail of et ceteras,) before I should be active in weakening any hold which government might think it prudent to resort to, in the management of that large part of the king's subjects. I do not choose to direct all my precautions to the part where the danger does not press, and to leave myself open and unguarded where I ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VI. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... solemn and so important, there is a special need that the intellectual force of the country should be active and efficient. It is a time for great minds to speak their thoughts boldly, and to take position as the advance guard. To this end, there is a special want unsupplied. It is that of an Independent Magazine, which shall be open to the first intellects of the land, and which shall ...
— Continental Monthly - Volume 1 - Issue 3 • Various

... child," quoted Jack Atkinson, grey haired darkey, when being interviewed, "and I done started in my second childhood. I useter be active as a cat, but I ain't, ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves: Volume IV, Georgia Narratives, Part 1 • Works Projects Administration

... or Intuition, aid me in the business which I expect to undertake tomorrow. I will that my faculty of grasping at details and understanding their relations shall be active. May it draw from my memory the hidden things which will ...
— The Mystic Will • Charles Godfrey Leland

... never rest much while my faculties last, and (if I know myself) have a certain something in me that would still be active in rusting and corroding me, if I flattered myself that I was in repose. On the other hand, I think that my habit of easy self-abstraction and withdrawal into fancies has always refreshed and strengthened ...
— The Letters of Charles Dickens - Vol. 2 (of 3), 1857-1870 • Charles Dickens

... you that Lafayette assented to all that I said. He had reason for the impracticability of getting aside the personal interests which would be active in defeating such a reform, that involved details and a knowledge of character to which I had nothing to say; and, as respects the Duc de Bordeaux, he affirmed that the reign of the Bourbons was over in France. The country was ...
— A Residence in France - With An Excursion Up The Rhine, And A Second Visit To Switzerland • J. Fenimore Cooper

... had been ordered unexpectedly to Barry for loading, to take the place of an unready sister-ship; and Macandrew, of whom I have had much experience, would be active, critical of what a dog must put up with in life, and altogether unfit for intimate, amiable, and reminiscent conversation. Yet I wanted to see him again before he left, and went past the Board of Trade Office hoping for signs of the Medea, for I had heard she was assembling a crew ...
— London River • H. M. Tomlinson

... microscope; compare it with your own. Before using the high power, put a cover glass over the object, of course. Scrape the roof of the mouth of the frog gently, to obtain ciliated epithelium; and mount in very weak salt solution— the cilia will still be active. Squamous epithelium may be seen by the student similarly scraping the interior of his own cheek. Take a piece of muscle from one of the frog's limbs, tease out with needles upon a glass slip, and examine. To see the striations clearly, the high power will be needed. ...
— Text Book of Biology, Part 1: Vertebrata • H. G. Wells

... what I have just been saying. When we are sleeping naturally, it is not necessary to believe, as has often been supposed, that our senses are closed to external sensations. Our senses continue to be active. They act, it is true, with less precision, but in compensation they embrace a host of "subjective" impressions which pass unperceived when we are awake—for then we live in a world of perceptions common to all men—and which ...
— Dreams • Henri Bergson

... spices flow abroad To entertain our Saviour God: And faith, and love, and joy appear, And every grace be active here. ...
— Hymns and Spiritual Songs • Isaac Watts

... honor imposes on me, requires me for at least a week to be absent from Sorrento. The trial of Count Monte-Leone will begin in a few days, and I must be present at it. It is said," added he, with hesitation and a significant glance at the Marquis, "that the Count's partisans will on that occasion be active. His enemies too are numerous, and as he is known to have come to this house, I cannot feel satisfied unless some courageous and energetic man replaces me, and deigns to watch over the two dear beings I am forced to leave. This, Marquis, is what I ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various

... the free, almost defiant, movement of her upraised arms; and in the ample lines of her throat and bosom, which melted gradually into the low curves of her hips, she might have stood for an incarnation of vital force. One felt instinctively that her personality would be active rather than passive—that the events which she attracted to herself would be ...
— The Deliverance; A Romance of the Virginia Tobacco Fields • Ellen Glasgow

... dangerous, reckless man, without any principles worth mentioning. Indeed, I have so few that I shall have recourse to violence, my son, if you do not assume a more reposeful manner. The evening will be active enough to make any further excitement quite superfluous. Have patience. An hour or so means little to anyone ...
— The Unspeakable Gentleman • John P. Marquand

... useless it had been; and now, when I came hither with a heart full of glad expectancy to place all I have to offer of mind and gifts at your disposal, I did so, my Lord, because I long to achieve great and noble, and difficult or, if it might be, impossible deeds—to be active, to ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... was just surprised, that's all. But deep behind the telepathic barrier he had erected against her probing mind, he was thinking something else. He had been assigned to London to capture the Controller—then unknown—who was said to be active in England. But his recall order had been decided upon before Harris was caught—or even suspected. Someone in the UN Psychodeviant Police Supreme Headquarters in New York must have known that Harris ...
— The Penal Cluster • Ivar Jorgensen (AKA Randall Garrett)

... hope, in some degree, learnt rather to reverence and submit to the hand of God than to be unquiet under it, and, as to the late providences that have fallen out amongst us, however, in respect of the particular engagements that lay upon me, I could not be active in making a change in the government of these nations, yet, through the goodness of God, I can freely acquiesce in it, being made." He promised, in conclusion, to live peaceably under the new government, and to do all in his power to induce those with whom ...
— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson

... that, notwithstanding his endeavours to persuade them, his most experienced voyagers still declined engaging without very exorbitant wages. After some hesitation, however, six men engaged with us, who were represented to be active and steady; and I also got Mr. Robertson's permission for St. Germain, an interpreter belonging to this Company, to accompany us from Slave Lake if he should choose. The bowmen and steersmen{39} were to receive one thousand six hundred livres ...
— Narrative of a Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, in the Years 1819-20-21-22, Volume 1 • John Franklin

... avoiding the effects of a veto; or "Resolves" were passed which had the force, though not the name, of statutes. In times of crisis the Crown showed energy in trying to draw out the military strength of the colonies; but if the assemblies hung back there was no means of forcing them to be active. During the Stuart period the troubles at home prevented strict attention to colonial matters. Under the Hanoverian kings the colonies were little disturbed by any active interference. In one respect ...
— Formation of the Union • Albert Bushnell Hart

... to me the prospect of paridisic futurity. I shall be active in the promoting the benefit of my country, and rise superior to dirty, narrow, selfish views! recompensed by your approbation, your joys, and sometimes by your tears. Your gentle hand shall reach me the petitions of the wretched, the widow, and the orphan,—and ...
— The Lawyers, A Drama in Five Acts • Augustus William Iffland

... head only in the service of their belly, in other words, look upon it as an instrument of the will, and those very few and rare persons who have the courage to say: No! it is too good for that; my head shall be active only in its own service; it shall try to comprehend the wondrous and varied spectacle of this world, and then reproduce it in some form, whether as art or as literature, that may answer to my character as an individual. These are the truly noble, ...
— The Art of Literature • Arthur Schopenhauer

... Baldwin IV., but he declined battle and he was consequently deposed both from his regency and from his right of succession, while Sibylla's son by her first husband was crowned king as Baldwin V. in 1183. For a time Baldwin IV. still continued to be active; but in 1184 he handed over the regency to Raymund of Tripoli, and ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 3, Part 1, Slice 2 - "Baconthorpe" to "Bankruptcy" • Various

... in clear, decisive words, the conclusion is expressed that no man may boast of life unless he has love. If it is true that faith must be active, it is conversely true that the absence of fruitage demonstrates one's continuance in the old Cain-like manner of existence, torpid and dead, bereft of solace and the experience of God's grace and life. Let no one presume to think he has passed into life so long as he ...
— Epistle Sermons, Vol. III - Trinity Sunday to Advent • Martin Luther

... as trifling compared with the object, urged the dispatch of an imposing force of not less than fifteen thousand men, which would add to the opinion entertained abroad of our power, resources, and energy; five thousand of these to be active troops; ten thousand an enrolled reserve. The acquisition of Louisiana was the grand popular feature of the foreign policy of the first term of Jefferson's administration. The internal management left much to ...
— Albert Gallatin - American Statesmen Series, Vol. XIII • John Austin Stevens

... jot; your rhetoric and your politeness are thrown away; your apology avails nothing. If your situation in life is a sedentary one, your amusements, your recreations, at least, should be active. You ought to walk or ride; or, if the weather prevents that, play at billiards. But let us examine your course of life. While the mornings are long, and you have leisure to go abroad, what do you do? Why, instead of gaining an appetite for breakfast, by salutary exercise, you amuse yourself ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to Prose, Vol. IX (of X) - America - I • Various

... not soe: those words Retaine affinity with that passion I hop'd youd left. The greatest of your Sinns Mercy will smile at, when you doe implore Its unconsuming grace: the dullest cloud Will, when you pray, be active as the ayre In opening to receive that breath to heaven Thats spent to purge your ills. Why, you may live To make a faire lustration for your faults And ...
— A Collection of Old English Plays, Vol. II • Various

... to offer, and they are glad at last to reach the valley and lie down in quiet graves. But while we live and are still wanderers, Amelia, we must not fold our hands in idleness; we must work and achieve. You also, my sister, must be active and energetic; an unusual opportunity is now offered you. The Abbess of Quedlinberg is dead, and you can now enter ...
— Frederick The Great and His Family • L. Muhlbach

... used three times a week and prolonged hot water injections at bed time. Cotton soaked in ichthyol and glycerin are frequently of benefit three times a week used as a tampon. The patient should not be on her feet much, or be active. Witch-hazel water can be added to the hot water ...
— Mother's Remedies - Over One Thousand Tried and Tested Remedies from Mothers - of the United States and Canada • T. J. Ritter

... that vain thoughts enter not; yet enter they will, there are so many porches to enter in at, and our narrow spirits cannot watch at all. Every sense will let in objects, and imagination itself will be active in framing them, and presenting them: but yet the endeavour of a Christian will be, not to let them lodge long within (Jer. iv. 14.). If they come in unawares, he will labour to make a diversion to a better purpose, ...
— The Works of the Rev. Hugh Binning • Hugh Binning

... King Alphonso: "Time presses; the King of France is advancing in person on Naples; be instant in solicitation; be importunate if necessary, so that the Turkish army cross the sea without delay. Be present yourself at the embarkation of the troops. Be active; run; fly." He himself ran through all his kingdom, striving to resuscitate some little spark of affection and hope. He had no success anywhere; the memory of the king his father was hateful; he was himself young and without influence; his ardor caused fear instead of sympathy. Charles kept advancing ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume III. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... all that is done. Thus the defects, if any there are, will be more known and observed; and if they arise from need the hospital will finally have more, and those from among the best in the state, who will be active in their efforts to supply ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume X, 1597-1599 • E. H. Blair

... Willy good-bye at London Bridge, and wished him well with his shop, these sentiments ceased to be active forces in him, and they lay latent in his life of restaurants and bar rooms until the summer returned, and he received an invitation from the Manor House to come down for a garden party at Mrs. Berkins's. When he opened the letter ...
— Spring Days • George Moore

... settlements their own, And in their intercepted letters, speak, Of farms, and tenements, secured for friends, Which, if they gain, brave soldiers, let with blood, The purchase, be seal'd down. Let every arm, This day be active, in fair freedom's cause, And shower down, from the hill, like Heav'n in wrath, Full store of lightning, and fierce iron hail, To blast the adversary. Let this ground, Like burning AEtna or Vesuvius top, Be wrapt in flame—The word is, ...
— The Battle of Bunkers-Hill • Hugh Henry Brackenridge

... column possesses rigidity, might greatly modify the views of thinkers. When with low frequencies and insignificant potentials indications of that property may be noted, how must a gaseous medium behave under the influence of enormous electrostatic stresses which may be active in the interstellar space, and which may alternate with inconceivable rapidity? The existence of such an electrostatic, rhythmically throbbing force—of a vibrating electrostatic field—would show a possible way how solids might have formed from the ultra-gaseous uterus, and how transverse ...
— Experiments with Alternate Currents of High Potential and High - Frequency • Nikola Tesla

... suggested to him that he was in the end to become a religious founder. One of the most interesting aspects of his life is in fact the continual development revealing itself in him; he is of the small number to whom to live is to be active, and to be active to make progress. There is hardly anyone, except St. Paul, in whom is found to the same degree the devouring need of being always something more, always something better, and it is so beautiful in both of them only because it is ...
— Life of St. Francis of Assisi • Paul Sabatier

... saw how his manse is bedecket! Ilk room's like a palace, it's plenished sae fine; And then wi' the best in the land he's respecket, And aft wi' My Lord is invited to dine. O Rab, then, be active; frae him tak' example; His case speaks mair powerfu' than ocht I can say; And soon ye will find that your talents are ample; For whare there's a will ...
— Chambers' Edinburgh Journal, No. 421, New Series, Jan. 24, 1852 • Various

... must be active," said Dale, seriously. "You must do things. It doesn't matter what, just as long as ...
— The Man of the Forest • Zane Grey

... determine which was the more oppressed with horror and amazement: Neville Landless, or John Jasper. But that Jasper's position forced him to be active, while Neville's forced him to be passive, there would have been nothing to choose between them. Each ...
— The Mystery of Edwin Drood • Charles Dickens

... is put here for a purpose. He is put here to work, to struggle, to interest himself in his fellows, to share the pleasures and disappointments of others. The wise laws ruling the universe fill us with a DESIRE to do that which we were meant to do. It is intended that we should be active here, and, therefore, although we often fail to realize it, ...
— Editorials from the Hearst Newspapers • Arthur Brisbane

... active here and there: when will Spirit be active in the whole? When will mankind, in the mass, ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... to stand still, is usually to go backward. Owing to war conditions, and missing one meeting, we have had little chance to increase our membership. I sincerely trust that the Membership Committee will be active while here, and extend an invitation to all to become members, and to help advance an industry that will be for the good of posterity, and should give us much pleasure during ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Sixth Annual Meeting. Rochester, New York, September 1 and 2, 1915 • Various

... repeated here that a person cannot expect to grow a plant satisfactorily until he learns the natural time of the plant to grow and to bloom. Many persons handle their begonias, cacti, and azaleas as if they should be active the whole year round. The key to the situation is water: at what part of the year to withhold and at what part to apply is one of the very first things ...
— Manual of Gardening (Second Edition) • L. H. Bailey

... Boswell's Life of Johnson, over a dinner-party where a man like that was present! If he paid Johnson the most trumpery of compliments, Johnson bowed low, and down it went on Boswell's cuff! Yet we go on perpetuating it. We don't require that such a man should be active, public-spirited, wise. If he is fond of field-sports, fairly business-like, kindly, courteous, decently virtuous, we think him a great man, and feel mildly elated at meeting him and being spoken to civilly by him. I don't mean that only snobs feel that; ...
— Father Payne • Arthur Christopher Benson

... hear locusts yet, singing in the sunny hours, and crickets have not yet finished their song. Once in a while I see a caterpillar,—this afternoon, for instance, a red, hairy one, with black head and tail. They do not appear to be active, and it makes one rather melancholy ...
— Passages From The American Notebooks, Volume 2. • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... creation of abstract form; and if we are to find in art emotional satisfaction, it is essential that we shall become creators of form. We must not be content to contemplate merely; we must create; we must be active in our dealings ...
— Art • Clive Bell

... with the irritating survivals of feudalism was not that the nation was miserable and oppressed above all others, but that it was sufficiently free and enlightened to realize the evils and absurdities of the old rgime. Mere oppression and misery does not account for a revolution, there must also be active discontent; and of that there was a great abundance in France, as we shall see. The French peasant no longer looked up to his lord as his ruler and protector, but viewed him as a sort of legalized robber who demanded a share of his precious harvest, whose officers awaited the ...
— An Introduction to the History of Western Europe • James Harvey Robinson

... will so manifest itself to all. Meanwhile it is enough to assert in general terms that Ireland is entitled to all those things which render a people happy and contented. That wished-for state is not far off; let them continue to be active in its pursuit. A previous chapter has already touched upon the great means to be employed in bringing this about: association, whose centre should be Ireland, and whose branches should spread wherever Irishmen have established themselves; whose guides should be the clergy, ...
— Irish Race in the Past and the Present • Aug. J. Thebaud

... Lord. But, on the other hand, this Divine Spirit, the Source of all purity, will not purify the soul without the man's efforts. 'Ye have purified your souls.' You need the Spirit indeed. But you are not mere passive recipients. You are to be active co-operators. In this region, too, we are 'labourers together with God.' We cannot of ourselves do the work, for the very powers with which we do it, or try to do it, are themselves in need of cleansing. And for a man to try to purify the soul by his own effort alone is to play the part ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Ephesians; Epistles of St. Peter and St. John • Alexander Maclaren

... fault that their parents were prolific, and that they had been hatched in a climate eminently conducive to their vigour and happiness. Their numbers and their voracity showed that they, too, were compelled by the struggle for life to be active and enterprising. Unlike some beings of a higher order, they did not take this trouble sadly; but, ...
— Two Summers in Guyenne • Edward Harrison Barker

... happy only when in his own mind he realizes his happiness, and calm is necessary to give full play to his mind; therefore without calm man would truly never be completely happy, and pleasure, in order to be felt, must cease to be active. Then what do they mean by ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... another way the masters are like children, from the constant waiting upon that they receive. One would think, where one class does all the thinking and the other all the working, that masters would be active thinkers and slaves ready workers; but neither result seems to happen—both ...
— Maria Mitchell: Life, Letters, and Journals • Maria Mitchell

... am, too," she retorted. "Although I have n't used that intelligence in the right way. Don't smile! I 'm not going to turn mawkish. I 'm not good. I don't know whether I want to be. But I know one thing: I 've got to keep busy—I 've got to be active. I ...
— Never-Fail Blake • Arthur Stringer

... 'We must be active, Oliver, and not give way to useless grief,' said Mrs. Maylie, laying her finger on her lip, as she looked steadily into his face; 'this letter must be sent, with all possible expedition, to Mr. ...
— Oliver Twist • Charles Dickens

... to be active and diligent; nor is that all; they should also be early subjected to restraint. This misfortune, if it really be one, is inseparable from their sex; nor do they ever throw it off but to suffer more cruel evils. They must be ...
— A Vindication of the Rights of Woman - Title: Vindication of the Rights of Women • Mary Wollstonecraft [Godwin]

... disturbances of circulation may be due to structural affection of vessels, or functional disorders of the heart, and in some instances, a combination of these causes may be active. ...
— Lameness of the Horse - Veterinary Practitioners' Series, No. 1 • John Victor Lacroix

... Revolutionary epoch, that is, the last quarter of the eighteenth century, when the conscience of men began to be active on the subject of human bondage. We think that the disposition to recognize the wickedness and impolity of slavery was a part of the general movement which came on in civilization, tending to revolutionize not only the political but the social and ethical condition of mankind. We know ...
— Notable Events of the Nineteenth Century - Great Deeds of Men and Nations and the Progress of the World • Various

... if the bodily members or the passions stir at all, it is a good and desirable thing for them to be ruled by reason; but further that it is a positive addition to human perfection that they should stir and be active, provided reason guide them. (Ethics, c. iv., s. i., n. 6, ...
— Moral Philosophy • Joseph Rickaby, S. J.

... ever-shuttered windows. Though it is she who now has ordered the unwelcome light to be admitted, he overlooks this in his enervation, and says how, before ever they met, he had observed that her windows were always blind till noon. The rest of the little world of Asolo would be active in the day's employment; but her house "would ope no eye." "And ...
— Browning's Heroines • Ethel Colburn Mayne

... hard rather than difficult work; that is difficult which involves skill, sagacity, or address, with or without a considerable expenditure of physical force; a geometrical problem may be difficult to solve, a tangled skein to unravel; a mountain difficult to ascend. Hard may be active or passive; a thing may be hard to do or hard to bear. Arduous is always active. That which is laborious or toilsome simply requires the steady application of labor or toil till accomplished; toilsome is the ...
— English Synonyms and Antonyms - With Notes on the Correct Use of Prepositions • James Champlin Fernald

... do very well in a country store, but in the city we want boys to be active and wide awake. I don't want to say anything against him. He was perfectly honest, ...
— Chester Rand - or The New Path to Fortune • Horatio Alger, Jr

... Yet there can be active scandal without sin on the part of the person scandalized, as stated above ...
— Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) • Thomas Aquinas

... place the money in Mercedes' name as special capital. But the other two men seemed to be active, progressive fellows. They reposed confidence in St. Clair, and they had always known him. After all, the old man tried to think, the qualities required to keep moneys separate were not those that went best to make it, and stock-broking was suited to a gambler ...
— Pirate Gold • Frederic Jesup Stimson

... come to pass, not only that love, hatred, &c. will be destroyed (V:ii.), but also that the appetites or desires, which are wont to arise from such emotion, will become incapable of being excessive (IV:lxi.). For it must be especially remarked, that the appetite through which a man is said to be active, and that through which he is said to be passive is one and the same. For instance, we have shown that human nature is so constituted, that everyone desires his fellow-men to live after his own fashion (III:xxxi.Note); in a man, who is not guided by ...
— Ethica Ordine Geometrico Demonstrata - Part I: Concerning God • Benedict de Spinoza

... Kennedy, and will report yourself to Marshal Vendome. I have arranged with him that one of my aides-de-camp shall accompany the force that is about to advance, and shall keep me informed of what is being done. I have selected you because I know you to be active and shrewd. The marshal is too much occupied to send me such full reports as I should wish, and I look to you not only to give me facts, but to convey to me your impressions of what you see passing ...
— In the Irish Brigade - A Tale of War in Flanders and Spain • G. A. Henty

... a thought so unhuman, so impossible? It could not be!—No, no; it could not be! A supposition so extravagant is guilt—Yet though I who cannot aid him ought not to encourage such doubts, let those who can be warned, and be active! ...
— Anna St. Ives • Thomas Holcroft

... "If spry be active, mistress," said a voice from the darkness aft, "then should you find naught here amiss. Right lusty workers, these, I promise you! Roundly, men, and a shilling each if we ...
— The Panchronicon • Harold Steele Mackaye

... wherever you are located you will do all that you can for community uplift. Be active in church and Sunday-school work, help to improve the public schools, assist in bettering health conditions, help the people to secure property, to buy homes and to improve them. In doing all these things, you will be ...
— Booker T. Washington - Builder of a Civilization • Emmett J. Scott and Lyman Beecher Stowe

... of the waist interfere with the vital organs and prevent the body from being perfect in its development, or perfect in its action. The activity of the body is an evidence of its life, and if it is so tied up that it cannot be active, it certainly is not in the fullest ...
— What a Young Woman Ought to Know • Mary Wood-Allen

... means and the results to be realized, in what instances, in what measure, at what time, it shall please the sovereign Power. The appointment cannot be one of mere exercise for the faculties and submissive obedience of those who are summoned to be active in its execution. ...
— An Essay on the Evils of Popular Ignorance • John Foster

... Another axiom of medicine is that so long as a man is able to be active and vigorous, does not eat until he is over-full, and does not suffer from constipation, he is not liable to disease. Even such men, however, are much safer if they do not take food ...
— Old-Time Makers of Medicine • James J. Walsh

... abandoned politics since then, and that now he don't care whether we have any more November elections or not. I asked him once if he would be active during the next campaign, as usual, and he said he thought not. He said a man couldn't afford to be too active in a political campaign. His constitution ...
— Remarks • Bill Nye

... reduce the sail, and in the course of twenty minutes they had got in the studding-sails, and all the standing canvas to the topsails, the fore-course, and a forward stay-sail. The three topsails were then reefed, with sundry urgent commands to the crew to be active, for, "The Englishman was coming up like a horse, all this time, ...
— Homeward Bound - or, The Chase • James Fenimore Cooper

... young women will have high and responsible positions as educators. Some will be heads and others will be active workers in our widely extended and valuable women's clubs. Some will have a hand in political action, in lifting politics out of its many-times low condition into its rightful state in being an agent for the accomplishment of the people's ...
— The Higher Powers of Mind and Spirit • Ralph Waldo Trine

... in respect to human evolution is, whether there will be always a possibility for the existence of an impulse to progress, an impulse to make great claims on life, to be active and to alter the conditions of life instead of adapting to them in a passive manner. Many people do not develop because they have too few necessities, and because they have no power to imagine other conditions ...
— Darwin and Modern Science • A.C. Seward and Others

... tale, in come the same fellow, with a woman, none of the least agreeable, and looking upon Ascyltos, entreated him to walk in and fear nothing, for if he would not be passive he might be active: the woman on the other hand press'd me to go in with her. We follow'd therefore, and being led among those bills, we saw many of both sexes at work in the cells, so much every of them seem'd to ...
— The Satyricon • Petronius Arbiter

... not clearly see. They slumber in their priesthood, take their emoluments, grow fat, go their small way, and believe they have discharged their duty. That is not the case. When a man has the honour to be a priest, he must be active. It is necessary, as in the time of the persecutions, to make proselytes and win souls; to confront the irreligious propaganda with our propaganda; lampoons, with lampoons; speeches, with sermons; acts, with acts. In short, we must struggle. Can ...
— The Grip of Desire • Hector France

... in the gastric mucous membrane; and Cagniard la Tour and Schwann independently discovered that the really active principle of the gastric juice is a substance which was named pepsin, and which was shown by Schwann to be active in the presence ...
— A History of Science, Volume 4(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams

... thus meeting together may stimulate the family to more devotion of heart to the service of their God; at home and abroad to mind their different callings, however varied; and to be active in helping others. It is proposed that this meeting should take place once a month at each house in rotation. I now have drawn some little outline of what I desire, and if any of you like to unite with me ...
— Elizabeth Fry • Mrs. E. R. Pitman

... Vicar-General for Germany. To this association belonged the convent at Erfurt. Its inmates were treated with marked favour and respect by the higher and educated classes in the town. They were said to be active in preaching and in the care of souls, and to cultivate among themselves the study of theology. Arnoldi, Luther's teacher, belonged to this convent. As the Order possessed no property, but all its members lived on alms, the monks ...
— Life of Luther • Julius Koestlin

... colonists call these Indians a lazy race. Man in general will not be active without an object. Now when the Indian has caught plenty of fish, and killed game enough to last him for a week, what need has he to range the forest? He has no idea of making pleasure-grounds. Money is of no use to him, for in these ...
— Wanderings In South America • Charles Waterton

... adapted to human nature, so that human nature can follow its laws and attractions and go rightly, and be its own guide. I might do something in directing such an organization, but would be useless in any other way. As we all like to be active, I would like exceedingly to take part in and help construct a ...
— Brook Farm • John Thomas Codman

... completely at the disposal of the General. I saw him several times when I was passing backwards and forwards, and he looked to me as if the beef was a little too thick on the outside of his forehead, for the brains to be active inside. Still, the Colonels have no fault to find with him, except that between times he would talk about drinking to Little Mac, and brag about the prospect, as the papers seem to say, of Fitz John Porter's being cleared. But ...
— Red-Tape and Pigeon-Hole Generals - As Seen From the Ranks During a Campaign in the Army of the Potomac • William H. Armstrong

... doing Be active as the fire and mercilesse As is the boundlesse Ocean when it swallows Whole Townes and ...
— Old English Plays, Vol. I - A Collection of Old English Plays • Various

... him quickly, groping, yet moving rapidly. It was like playing blind man's buff with everyone blindfolded except one. "Get hold of him!" cried one. He found himself in the arc of a loose curve of pursuers. He felt suddenly he must be active and resolute. ...
— The Door in the Wall And Other Stories • H. G. Wells

... shall most undoubtedly learn—the means whereby we can purify it, and still further increase it. As we observe its incessant activity in the depths of our heart, the only temple where it can truly be active: as we watch it blending with all that we think, and feel, and do, we shall quickly discover which are the things that throw light upon it, and which those that plunge it in darkness; which are the things ...
— The Buried Temple • Maurice Maeterlinck

... incentive. There may well be doubt as to whether a punishment is an incentive to action or not. This, however, is only at first glance, and the whole thing rests on the meaning of the word "action." To be active is certainly the opposite of being at rest. This being true, punishment is just as surely an incentive to action as is reward. The man who is punished in every case will be led to some sort of action. Whether ...
— The Psychology of Management - The Function of the Mind in Determining, Teaching and - Installing Methods of Least Waste • L. M. Gilbreth

... is on the strength of that loan I am enabled to continue the bold game which, a while since, I feared I should never play more. Total ruin I know will follow loss, and I am aware that gain is doubtful; but I am quite cheerful. So long as I can be active, so long as I can strive, so long, in short, as my hands are not tied, it is impossible for me to be depressed. One year—nay, but six months—of the reign of the olive, and I am safe; for, as you say, peace will give an impulse to commerce. In this you are right; but as to ...
— Shirley • Charlotte Bronte

... notable. Southern friends, confident in the ultimate success of the Confederacy and equally confident that they had with them the great bulk of upper-class opinion in England, at first thought it unnecessary to be active in public expressions aside from such as were made through the newspapers. Up to November, 1862, The Index records no Southern public meeting. But by the summer of 1863, the indefatigable Spence had come to the conclusion ...
— Great Britain and the American Civil War • Ephraim Douglass Adams

... exhilaration in the crisp air. He felt an unwonted liveliness and a desire to be active which would have surprised some of his teachers at the school he had just left. The depression of spirits of which he had been conscious the previous night had disappeared along with his premonitions of unpleasantness. He felt optimistic this morning. After giving ...
— The Portygee • Joseph Crosby Lincoln

... that men shall be clothed with the monstrous authority to demoralize neighborhoods and scatter the fire-brands of death and destruction. The power to arrest this horrible work is in your hands. Be vigilant, be active. There is resistless might in the energy of earnest wills devoted to a noble cause. Petition, remonstrate, work while yet it is day. Say not that we can gain nothing by petitioning. Was it not through this means, we obtained the law under which ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume I • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... happy. Fancy meeting twenty or thirty boys going along together, every one of them lame or deformed in some way! Some go on crutches, and some hobble, and others limp; but they do not seem to mind, because, perhaps, they have never known what it is to be active like other boys, and there are plenty of pleasant things ...
— The Children's Book of London • Geraldine Edith Mitton



Words linked to "Be active" :   rouse, rest, move, bestir



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