"Chance" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... into his hands. Besides the general popularity attending his cause, a new incident made his approach to London still more grateful. In the present trepidation of the people, a rumor arose, either from chance or design, that the disbanded Irish had taken arms, and had commenced a universal massacre of the Protestants. This ridiculous belief was spread all over the kingdom in one day, and begat every ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part F. - From Charles II. to James II. • David Hume
... started, without a companion. Three days afterwards he overtook us at Keadom, radiant with joy at having found the instrument: he had gone up to the hot springs, and vainly sought around them that evening; then rather than lose the chance of a day-light search on his way back, he had spent the cold October night in the hot water, without fire or shelter, at 16,000 feet above the sea. Next morning his search was again fruitless; and he was returning disconsolate, when he descried the brass case glistening between two planks of the ...
— Himalayan Journals (Complete) • J. D. Hooker
... times. It seems to have had a great circulation, and probably many and mixed results. So far as it encouraged that abominable system, which was already falling like a blight upon religious faith, of living according to motives of expedience and the wiser chance, its effects must have been utterly bad. It may also have exercised an unsettling influence upon some minds. Although Tillotson was probably entirely mistaken in the conviction, by no means peculiar to him, that the idea of endless punishment ...
— The English Church in the Eighteenth Century • Charles J. Abbey and John H. Overton
... worries at this time was the fear that by chance he might come upon a review of 'Margaret Home.' Since the publication of his first book he had avoided as far as possible all knowledge of what the critics had to say about him; his nervous temperament could not bear the agitation of reading these remarks, ...
— New Grub Street • George Gissing
... good," he approved. "Keep track of your time, and we'll correct when we get a chance to shift course to the south. We can determine whatever final correction is ...
— The Players • Everett B. Cole
... of age should be taught to swim. The art, once mastered, is never forgotten. It calls into use a wide combination of muscles. This accomplishment, so easily learned, should be a part of our education, as well as baseball or bicycling, as it may chance to any one to save his own life or that ...
— A Practical Physiology • Albert F. Blaisdell
... Colonel told Claude and David to bring their men up to the communication before light, and hold them ready. "Give Owens' cement a chance, but don't let the enemy put over any ...
— One of Ours • Willa Cather
... ain't business! I did what I promised fair and square; I was giving you a chance to ...
— Michael O'Halloran • Gene Stratton-Porter
... turned at once to follow him, questioning myself, as I walked along, to what he could possibly allude. He knew of my attachment to Lucy Dashwood,—could he mean anything of her? But what could I expect there; by what flattery could I picture to myself any chance of success in that quarter; and yet, what other news could I care for or value than what bore upon her fate upon whom my own depended? Thus ruminating, I reached the door of the spacious building in which the ...
— Charles O'Malley, The Irish Dragoon, Volume 1 (of 2) • Charles Lever
... I have no desire to be shot, and I think there is much more fear of my being shot, if I don't answer to the call of my name than there will be if I do. In the first place, we may not go out beyond the wall, in the second place, if there is I may see a chance of running away, for mind you, though I hope I should have fought as bravely as others if the Germans had come, I do not feel myself called upon to fight against Frenchmen and in a cause ...
— A Girl of the Commune • George Alfred Henty
... two Connies, and I don't think they had a chance to yell. But I'm sorry about one, sir. Kemp had to swing at him and ...
— Rip Foster in Ride the Gray Planet • Harold Leland Goodwin
... style which give the Epistle a unique place among the works of St. Paul are caused by these considerations. He wishes to tell the Roman Christians his very best ideas in the very best way: this may be his last chance of doing so. He puts aside, then, all clamour of personal debate, and sets {163} himself to produce an ordered theological treatise. Never elsewhere does the apostle write with so careful method, so powerful concentration, so effective marshalling ...
— The Books of the New Testament • Leighton Pullan
... is not difficult to recall examples of them. No one, for instance, would talk of Scott's Tales of a Grandfather as indicating the power that produced Kenilworth and Guy Mannering. Nevertheless, without this chance minor compilation we should not really have the key of Scott. Without this one insignificant book we should not see his significance. For the truth was that Scott loved history more than romance, because he was so constituted as to ...
— Appreciations and Criticisms of the Works of Charles Dickens • G. K. Chesterton
... again, and ran from his room up to her mother's apartment, taking some back stairs well known to herself, lest she should by chance meet her lover after some undue and unprepared fashion. And there she could sit down and think of it all! She would be very discreet. He should be made to understand at once that the purgation must be thorough, the reform ...
— Sir Harry Hotspur of Humblethwaite • Anthony Trollope
... said he, with an Irishman's easy insolence, "Lookin' for a chance to steal somethin'—is it?" And then Kennedy was both amazed and enraptured at the prompt reply in the fervent ...
— A Daughter of the Sioux - A Tale of the Indian frontier • Charles King
... chance you must look otherwhere for your one housekeeper,' said Mrs. Golding. 'What sayest, Althea? Wilt be parted from thy sister that thou mayest have the honour of keeping house for so liberal a kinsman and ...
— Andrew Golding - A Tale of the Great Plague • Anne E. Keeling
... Senate was a chance in ten thousand. It is well known that at first he declined to be a candidate. He did not think he was fitted for the position, and when Caleb Gushing urged him to court the favor of fortune he said: "I will not leave my ...
— Cambridge Sketches • Frank Preston Stearns
... shall be perfectly free and untrammelled by the chains which still hang around us in Norridgeport. You know how often we have wanted to be set on some island in the Pacific Ocean, where we could build up a true society, right from the start. Now, here's a chance to try the experiment for a ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 9, No. 52, February, 1862 • Various
... withdrew into the thickets to escape the fire of their enemies, and to discuss their discomfiture. As one group of buccaneers lay in the jungle, a chance arrow, shot by an Indian in the fort, struck one of them in the arm. Springing to his feet with a cry of rage and pain, the wounded man cried out as he tore the ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 1 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot
... with me? Ziska-Charmazel! It is like the name of a romance or a gypsy tune. Bah! I must be dreaming! Her face, her eyes, are perfectly familiar; where, where have I seen her and played the mad fool with her before? Was she a model at one of the studios? Have I seen her by chance thus in her days of poverty, and does her image recall itself vividly now despite her changed surroundings? I know the very perfume of her hair ... it seems to creep into my blood ... it intoxicates me ...
— Ziska - The Problem of a Wicked Soul • Marie Corelli
... to send in Fairbairn and Porter last, when they would have no chance of scoring; or Coates, who was a rash hitter, and never was safe until the back of the bowling had been somewhat broken, might have been sent ...
— The Willoughby Captains • Talbot Baines Reed
... signifies good luck and good weather. The new moon seen for the first time over the right shoulder offers the chance for a ...
— Tea-Cup Reading, and the Art of Fortune-Telling by Tea Leaves • 'A Highland Seer'
... into an unduly extensive discussion of the laws of error. The mathematicians themselves tell us in general terms that the observations they describe so simply by their formulae follow as the result of so-called chance, by which they mean that the combined operation of numerous, diverse, and uncorrelated factors brings about this result, and not, of course, that there is such a thing as ...
— The Doctrine of Evolution - Its Basis and Its Scope • Henry Edward Crampton
... be jolly to know him out of the limelight," said the girl, seriously. "The girls were so crazy over him here that there wasn't a chance for a rational word with him, unless one were a man. He simply evaporated when he ...
— Miss Pat at School • Pemberton Ginther
... Society, but I have written notes to show it is still extant. You see, it is all my invention. Verree good. Sat Bhai has many members, and perhaps before they jolly-well-cut-your-throat they may give you just a chance of life. That is useful, anyhow. And moreover, these foolish natives—if they are not too excited—they always stop to think before they kill a man who says he belongs to any speecific organization. You see? You say then when ...
— Kim • Rudyard Kipling
... I could not press my point. Once, years afterward, Miss Battersby very nearly kissed me, but even before there was any chance of such a thing I was able to sympathize with Lalage. I crept out of the pigsty and went home ...
— Lalage's Lovers - 1911 • George A. Birmingham
... herdsmen; the Apostles mostly Judaean peasants and fishermen. The finest parables and similes in the speeches of Jesus are taken from the peasants' occupation and experience. And even to this day thousands of the scattered race are ready to seize again the plough and the spade, if they are given a chance, and not a few have done so even under the most disheartening conditions. The fact is, the pagan Mercury proved a more merciful god to the Jews than the Christian Jesus, as he was taught and practised by the mediaeval Church. He gloated over the sufferings ...
— Zionism and Anti-Semitism - Zionism by Nordau; and Anti-Semitism by Gottheil • Max Simon Nordau
... the tables drawn wi' care For an Insurance Company; Her chance o' life was stated there Wi' perfect perspicuity. But tables here, or tables there, She 's lived ten years beyond her share; An 's like to live a dozen mair ...
— The Modern Scottish Minstrel, Volumes I-VI. - The Songs of Scotland of the Past Half Century • Various
... was, Uncle Barney. I don't know anything about that. But I do know that Ruth has told me that her father never wanted nor tried to do you any injury. He claims that it was all a mistake, and that you should have given him a chance ...
— The Rover Boys on Snowshoe Island - or, The Old Lumberman's Treasure Box • Edward Stratemeyer
... being can transmit to another, is a ticklish one to handle. I cannot pack my pen, though, and take train of thought to the Belgian city without mentioning my friend Allonge, the well-known French artist, then a fellow-student of mine at the Ecole des Beaux Arts. A chance contact of our knees as we sat closely packed with some sixty other students put me on the track of a new subject, perhaps the most interesting one it was ever my good fortune to come across. ...
— In Bohemia with Du Maurier - The First Of A Series Of Reminiscences • Felix Moscheles
... first six months with a plain girl are confessedly inferior in attraction, the inference is clear that they do in effect attract less. Plainness or loveliness apart, a very large number of womankind have no reason to expect any very happy chance in married life; and if marriage is to be set before all women as the one ideal, a number of feminine lives will always turn out ...
— Modern Women and What is Said of Them - A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) • Anonymous
... attended Glumdalclitch, very officiously lifted me up to place me in the boat, but I happened to slip through her fingers, and should infallibly have fallen down forty feet upon the floor, if, by the luckiest chance in the world, I had not been stopped by a corking-pin[70] that stuck in the good gentlewoman's stomacher;[71] the head of the pin passed between my shirt and the waistband of my breeches, and thus I held by the middle in the air, till Glumdalclitch ...
— Gulliver's Travels - Into Several Remote Regions of the World • Jonathan Swift
... Genoese of old greeted their friends with the word Guadagna! or "Gain!" indicating as Rabelais declares, their sordid character, so the Gipsy, whose life is precarious, and who depends upon chance for his daily bread, replies to "Sarishan!" (good day!) with "Kushto bak!" or "Good luck to you!" The Arabic "Baksheesh" is from the same root ...
— The English Gipsies and Their Language • Charles G. Leland
... pleasure. That a man with such powers of mind, and charms of conversation, should have only a chance of changing, from what he was to what I hoped, was delightful. And that he should call upon me for advice, at such ...
— The Adventures of Hugh Trevor • Thomas Holcroft
... easily reached in the autumn and the fall flowers last much longer. Some of the species seen blooming in spring and early summer are now in fruit and scattering their seed, so that the pupils have a chance to follow out the whole life history of a few chosen species. The pupils in this Form might select for special study the milkweed, worm-seed mustard, wild aster, and goldenrod. These should be observed out-of-doors, ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: Nature Study • Ontario Ministry of Education
... now since she and Newell had become, in a sense, partners. An affliction had fallen upon each of them at about the same time, and, through what seemed chance, they had stretched out a hand each to steady the other, and gone on together. It was then that Dorcas's mother had had her first paralytic stroke, and Dorcas had given up the district school to be at home. But she was poor, and when ...
— Country Neighbors • Alice Brown
... instantly there came fluttering down before her astonished and bewildered eyes a piece of blotting paper. I snatched it hastily, and in terror lest I had already broken the charm and forfeited all chance of Mediumship, retired to the rear of the car and furtively replaced the precious pad. Decidedly I ...
— Preliminary Report of the Commission Appointed by the University • The Seybert Commission
... City Company that I hinted at," Sir Charles went on. "There was a chance of a fortune there. I recognized that chance, and I became a director. And there was risk, too. We took our chance, and the chance failed. We gambled desperately, and again fortune failed us. Certain people who were against us have made ...
— The Slave of Silence • Fred M. White
... mistaken; I am not to be deceived, neither can you hoodwink yourself. You like me, you love me, in the same quiet way that I love you; you admire me, perhaps, more than anyone you chance to know just now; you are partial to my beauty, and, from long habit, have come to regard me as your property, much in the same light as that in which you look upon your costly diamond buttons, or your ...
— Macaria • Augusta Jane Evans Wilson
... out his hands as though he would have said, See how miserable I am! 'Bitzer, I have but one chance left to soften you. You were many years at my school. If, in remembrance of the pains bestowed upon you there, you can persuade yourself in any degree to disregard your present interest and release my son, I entreat and pray you ...
— Hard Times • Charles Dickens*
... matters they will urge upon the reluctant ear of the English parliament? Should they not meet, if only to concert how best to recall the absentees to their long-neglected duties at home; how best to compel all the monies of the country to be spent at home; and thus to give a chance of saving our unhappy people from being swept off the face of the earth by widely-desolating famine, or the yet more desolating and dreadful agency of a bloody, a bootless, a ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan
... Garcia, but he's my comrade. Some day, maybe, I'll rid you of him, but we'll settle our account after the fashion of my country. It's only chance that has made me a gipsy, and in certain things I shall always be a thorough Navarrese,* ...
— Carmen • Prosper Merimee
... blood I might have given him his soldier's chance, but here again it was another's life or mine. Even so, I might have fought him fair, had he but held his tongue and fought in silence. But this he would not, so I had to quiet him or have the others about ...
— The Master of Appleby • Francis Lynde
... awaken Grace, but upon second thought she decided to wait. Perhaps it was the Mystery Man returning, though Elfreda did not believe he would take the chance of getting shot. ...
— Grace Harlowe's Overland Riders Among the Kentucky Mountaineers • Jessie Graham Flower
... thereby, but the home with all its civilising, humanising influences would develop more rapidly. Assuming variations in tribal life in this direction, there is no question as to which tribe that would stand the better chance of survival. The development of life has proceeded here as elsewhere by differentiation and specialisation; and while the tasks demanding the more sustained physical exertions were left to man, and to the performance of which his sexual nature offered no ...
— Religion & Sex - Studies in the Pathology of Religious Development • Chapman Cohen
... himself against the rest, moving about his body hither and thither and calling out, till he saw that Brutus had drawn his sword, when he pulled his toga over his face and offered no further resistance, having been driven either by chance or by the conspirators to the base on which the statue of Pompeius stood. And the base was drenched with blood, as if Pompeius was directing the vengeance upon his enemy who was stretched beneath his feet ...
— Plutarch's Lives Volume III. • Plutarch
... into the river, out of which he crawled as thoroughly wet as the unhappy little kitten, which Wrench received as it swam ashore, rolled up in his handkerchief and took home to his pantry, where it grew rapidly, waxed fat, and was never so happy as when it could find a chance to rub its head ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... Privates Donohue, Sacina, Beardsley and Muzzi. Private Swanson was right near me when he was shot. I closed up very close to the Germans with my bayonet on my rifle and prevented some of them who tried to leave the bunch and get into the bushes from leaving. I knew my only chance was to keep them together and also keep them between me and the Germans who were shooting. I heard Corp. York several times shouting to the machine gunners on the hill to come down and surrender, but from where I stood I could not see Corp. York. I saw him, however, when ...
— Sergeant York And His People • Sam Cowan
... was of the last importance to procure a supply of provisions at these islands; and experience having taught me that I could have no chance to succeed in this if a free trade with the natives were to be allowed; that is, if it were left to every man's discretion to trade for what he pleased, and in the manner he pleased; for this substantial ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... hurtful to pride as Confederate soldiers serving our country for duty's sake, and fear of officers replaces badly a soldier's pride in his work. Each soldier from that time feared Robertson. Had this soldier watched his chance and murdered the officer, and then deserted to the enemy, the general opinion would have been that such action was ...
— A History of Lumsden's Battery, C.S.A. • George Little
... American vessel they met and searched the crew in order to reclaim the English, Scotch or Irish on board. Frequently it happened that persons born in America were taken as British subjects; for, where the boarding officer was judge and jury of a man's nationality, there was little chance of justice, especially if the seaman was a promising one, or the officer's ship was short-handed. In nine months, during parts of the years 1796 and 1797, the American minister at the court of London had made application for the discharge of two hundred and seventy-one native born ...
— Sustained honor - The Age of Liberty Established • John R. Musick,
... know what you are?" he asked harshly. "Here's your chance to prove to me that you're ...
— The Huntress • Hulbert Footner
... heat and cold. A camping party should make their plans a long time ahead in order to get their equipment ready. Careful lists should be made of what we think we shall need. After we are out in the woods, there will be no chance to run around the corner to the grocer's to supply what we have forgotten. If it is forgotten, we must simply make the best of it and not allow ...
— Outdoor Sports and Games • Claude H. Miller
... and Mother Bunker saved some for daddy, so he had a chance to taste them, and he ate them at supper that night as he listened to the story of the ...
— Six Little Bunkers at Grandma Bell's • Laura Lee Hope
... said he, "suffer me to go with my sweet sin, and I will kindle in Britain the sparks of Hell so universally, that it shall become one with this place of unextinguishable flame; for there is not much chance, that any one will return from following me, to lay hold of the paths of Life." And thereupon he ...
— The Sleeping Bard - or, Visions of the World, Death, and Hell • Ellis Wynne
... offering five hundred pounds reward for his apprehension: this was a stroke, the playing and winning of which might well give any adventurous spirit pleasure: the loss of the stake might involve a heavy penalty, but all our family were eager to risk that for the glorious chance ...
— The History of Henry Esmond, Esq. • W. M. Thackeray
... amending the articles of confederation by taking away from the states the power of regulating commerce, and intrusting this power to Congress. Others felt that if the work were not done thoroughly now another chance might never be offered; and these men thought it necessary to abolish the confederation, and establish a federal republic, in which the general government should act directly upon the people. The difficult problem was how to frame a plan of this sort which people could be made ...
— The Critical Period of American History • John Fiske
... index nor sharper test of national or individual character than the sort of 'heroes' they worship. Vox populi has not been very much refined since Saul's day. Athletes and soldiers still captivate the crowd, and a mere prophet like Samuel has no chance beside the man of broad shoulders and well-developed biceps. And very often communities, especially democratic ones, get the 'king' they desire, the leader, statesman or the like, who comes near their ideal. The man whom they choose is the man whom, generally, they deserve. Israel ...
— Expositions Of Holy Scripture - Volume I: St. Luke, Chaps. I to XII • Alexander Maclaren
... many of 'em do it, because there was too much danger that you would be walking along free one night, feel a hand over your mouth, and be back across the river and in slavery again in the morning. And nobody in the world ever got a chance to know as much misery as a slave that had ...
— Slave Narratives: A Folk History of Slavery in the United States - From Interviews with Former Slaves - Florida Narratives • Works Projects Administration
... pipe in his mouth Boyd Connoway was looking on and telling him how. The village of Eden Valley was never quieter. Several young men of the highest consideration were waiting within call of the millinery establishment of the elder Miss Huntingdon, on the chance of being able to lend her "young ladies" stray volumes of Rollin's Ancient History, Defoe's Religious Courtship, or such other volumes as were likely to fan the flame of love's young dream in their hearts. I saw Miss Huntingdon herself taking stock of them ...
— The Dew of Their Youth • S. R. Crockett
... was, in fact, this very certainty which made his struggle so hard. After all, why not? he asked himself a thousand times. Ellsworth's fears were surely exaggerated. Who could say that Frank Law had passed on his heritage? There was at least a chance that he had not, and it would require more than a remote possibility, more evidence than Ellsworth could summon, to dismay Alaire. Suppose it should transpire that he was somehow defective? What then? The signs of his mental failing would give ample warning. He could watch himself carefully ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach
... in one of the motors at Whiteladies we had considerable success. The car had taken the direct road to London. We heard of it at an inn on the outskirts of Beading. It had stopped there, and a man had had his flask filled with brandy. A lady who was with him was not very well, he said. Chance helped us farther. The car had stopped by a roadside cottage. A man had come to the door full of apologies, but seeing a light in the window he ventured to ask if they could oblige him with a box of matches. He was quite a gentleman—young, dark, and very merry—the ...
— The Master Detective - Being Some Further Investigations of Christopher Quarles • Percy James Brebner
... instructions, which he has never forgotten, though he has long tried to smother them. He now looks forward with terror to the fate which he well knows awaits all evil-doers, and shudders at the thought, but seems powerless to enter the only avenue which affords a chance of escape. He is so tormented with the pains and diseased conditions which he has brought upon himself by vice that he often looks to self-destruction as a grateful means of escape; but then comes the awful foreboding of future punishment, and his hand is stayed. Ashamed ...
— Plain Facts for Old and Young • John Harvey Kellogg
... conversation. What he said or heard, however, occupied only the extreme corners of his mind, the main portion of which was entirely filled with the chilling fear that that man might be the Keswick he was looking for. Of course, there was a bare chance that it was not, for there might be a numerous family, but even this little stupid glimmer of comfort was extinguished when Mr Brandon familiarly ...
— The Late Mrs. Null • Frank Richard Stockton
... situation. It was agreed that they could not honorably run away with the pirogue if it really belonged to Stede Bonnet's men, who must have come on foot along the higher ground back of the coast and descended the creek in the canoe stolen or purchased from Indians met by chance. ...
— Blackbeard: Buccaneer • Ralph D. Paine
... reciting yourself. Give the class a chance. Make them assume responsibility. Require them to rewrite themes until they are perfect in technique, but do not bother too much to point out their errors. Let ...
— Practical English Composition: Book II. - For the Second Year of the High School • Edwin L. Miller
... little more than two hundred a year, and he had resolved within his own mind that Dr Gruffen was esteemed as much the better doctor by the general public opinion of Guestwick, and that Dr Gruffen's sandy-haired assistant would even have a better chance of success in the town than himself, should it ever come to pass that the doctor was esteemed too old for personal practice. Crofts had no fortune of his own, and he was aware that Miss Dale had none. Then, under those circumstances, what ...
— The Small House at Allington • Anthony Trollope
... heads together, preparing the invasion of England; making arrangements for King Alexander's coronation in that island, and—like sensible, farsighted persons as they are—even settling the succession to the throne after Alexander's death, instead of carelessly leaving such distant details to chance, or subsequent consideration. On the other hand, plain Dutch sea-captains, grim beggars of the sea, and the like, denizens of a free commonwealth and of the boundless ocean-men who are at home on blue water, ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... with whom I was then living, were as kind as possible, and set me free to go. I was there in three days, and truly the dear, beautiful, merry girl I had parted with only a year before was a sad piteous sight. Mrs. Houghton seemed broken-hearted at leaving her, thinking there was little chance of her living; but Mr. Houghton, who, I am afraid, was a professed gambler, had got into some scrape, and was gone to Paris, where she had to follow him. She told me all about it, and how, when Captain Egremont fancied that a marriage in the Channel Islands was one he could play fast and ...
— Nuttie's Father • Charlotte M. Yonge
... calm as before.] My dear, I'm an intruder only for a moment; I sha'n't give you a chance to score off me again! But I must thank you, dear Philip, for rendering ...
— Representative Plays by American Dramatists: 1856-1911: The New York Idea • Langdon Mitchell
... and the drink,' said he, 'belong to the Household Spirit. If ye love your lives, leave them both untouched. But else have ye no harm to fear. If there chance a little din in the night, be ye but still ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLV. July, 1844. Vol. LVI. • Various
... customers Mrs. Day moaned to Deleah over the grievous subject of Franky's deterioration. "He even brushes his hair, and wears his cap, in the fashion of that dreadful Willy Spratt. Being so young he does not stand a chance. He must grow into just a ...
— Mrs. Day's Daughters • Mary E. Mann
... vices lest to knowe, Mi Sone, it hath noght ben unknowe, Fro ferst that men the swerdes grounde, That ther nis on upon this grounde, A vice forein fro the lawe, Wherof that many a good felawe Hath be distraght be sodein chance; And yit to kinde no plesance It doth, bot wher he most achieveth His pourpos, most to kinde he grieveth, 10 As he which out of conscience Is enemy to pacience: And is be name on of the Sevene, Which ofte hath set this world unevene, And cleped is the cruel Ire, ...
— Confessio Amantis - Tales of the Seven Deadly Sins, 1330-1408 A.D. • John Gower
... fingers over his closed eyes, as though to give Memory a better chance by shutting off the visible present, then withdraws them. "No, I remember no ...
— Somehow Good • William de Morgan
... supposed analogies of its lepidodendra and calamites, it was at least evident that they were the bole-like stems of great plants, that had stood erect like trees. A certain amount of fact, too, once acquired, enabled me to assimilate to the mass little snatches of information, derived from chance paragraphs and occasional articles in magazines and reviews, that, save for my previous acquaintance with the organisms to which they referred, would have told me nothing. And so the vegetation of the Coal Measures began gradually to form within my mind's eye, where all had been blank before, ...
— My Schools and Schoolmasters - or The Story of my Education. • Hugh Miller
... Frederic at Stuttgart. I first heard the news of the capture of Warsaw. Pale and with beating heart I ran to the hotel and told him all. He had an attack of hysteria; then I rushed to the piano and by chance struck out a phrase. It was in C sharp minor, and was almost identical with the theme of the C minor study. At once Chopin ceased his moaning and weeping and came over to the instrument. 'That's very pretty,' he said, and began making a running bass accompaniment. He was ...
— Melomaniacs • James Huneker
... leave in the warmest manner to recommend to your notice Mr. Moxon, the Bearer of this, if by any chance yourself should want a steady hand in your business, or know of any Publisher that may want such a one. He is at present in the house of Messrs. Longman and Co., where he has been established for more than six years, and has the conduct of one of the four departments of the ...
— The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb (Vol. 6) - Letters 1821-1842 • Charles and Mary Lamb
... liked Sheila's looks, but, being a man of violent prejudices, and disliking Dunne instinctively, he found it easy to dislike his friends. "I'll tell you what I'm going to do," he announced. "I'm going to put it up to these fellows straight the first chance I get that we don't care a hang for anything they may do. If they want trouble ...
— Desert Conquest - or, Precious Waters • A. M. Chisholm
... is held to be a mighty blessing to mankind, then of peace despotic monarchs are scant sharers. Or is war a curse? If so, of this particular pest your monarch shares the largest moiety. For, look you, the private citizen, unless his city-state should chance to be engaged in some common war, (5) is free to travel wheresoe'er he chooses without fear of being done to death, whereas the tyrant cannot stir without setting his foot on hostile territory. At any rate, nothing will persuade him but he must go through life armed, and on all ...
— Hiero • Xenophon
... in his man—Merriweather by name. I liked the first look at him—keen, cynical, indifferent. He had evidently sat in so many games of chance of all kinds that play roused in him only the ice-cold passion ...
— The Plum Tree • David Graham Phillips
... in all public places on the European continent, and they seized as many chairs as they could for friends who did not come, and at supreme moments they stood up on their chairs and spoiled such poor chance of seeing the queen-mother as the stranger might have had. While the good King Umberto lived the stranger would have had many other chances, for it is said that the queen showed herself with him to the people at the windows of their palace every afternoon; ...
— Roman Holidays and Others • W. D. Howells
... Ned, as he carefully withdrew the bullet from his carbine, and substituted for it a charge of small shot. "The fellows are certain to grow careless, sooner or later, and afford us a chance to give them the slip, even if we do not fall in with a man-of- war and get taken. Keep up your spirits, Miss Stanhope; keep up your spirits and your courage, I say, for I am always thinking and planning, and I never mean to rest ...
— The Missing Merchantman • Harry Collingwood
... incidents arousing pity and fear. Such incidents have the very greatest effect on the mind when they occur unexpectedly and at the same time in consequence of one another; there is more of the marvellous in them then than if they happened of themselves or by mere chance. Even matters of chance seem most marvellous if there is an appearance of design as it were in them; as for instance the statue of Mitys at Argos killed the author of Mitys' death by falling down on him when a looker-on at a public spectacle; ...
— The Poetics • Aristotle
... for me lately?" he asked. "I received the last you sent on by the merest chance, and after considerable delay through being inland; or I might ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... that this dog had bitten several persons in the neighborhood, and that some of the school boys had tried to poison it; but that the farmer was careful always to keep it chained, so that no body might get a chance to catch it ...
— The Summer Holidays - A Story for Children • Amerel
... being sprung, and the parts so very defective, as to make it absolutely necessary to replace them, and, of course, to unstep the mast. In this difficulty, Captain Cook was for some time in doubt, whether he should run the chance of meeting with a harbour in the islands to leeward, or return to Karakakooa. That bay was not so remarkably commodious, in any respect, but that a better might probably be expected, both for the purpose of repairing the masts, and ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume 16 • Robert Kerr
... was received with acclamations, and sang her songs delightfully; particularly 'Cease your Funning,' which was tumultuously encored. Miss George, who performed the part of Lucy (an up-hill singing part), perceiving that she had little chance of dividing the applause with the great magnet of the night, had recourse to the following stratagem: When the dialogue duet in the second act, 'Why, how now, Madam Flirt?' came on, Mrs. Billing-ton having given her verse with exquisite sweetness, Miss George, setting propriety ...
— Great Singers, First Series - Faustina Bordoni To Henrietta Sontag • George T. Ferris
... kept to the spirit, as well as the letter, of her promise. Jane, who was a very matter-of-fact young person, treated her with the same off-hand cordiality that she would have bestowed on any other chance acquaintance with interesting possibilities. The girls who stopped at the table to speak to Jane or Helen, smiled and nodded affably when they were introduced. Some of them stared a little, at the unusual combination of two prominent seniors and an obscure ...
— Betty Wales Senior • Margaret Warde
... woman quite accidentally and, as they were going in the same direction, he could not avoid walking with her without being positively rude. In this age men must, of necessity, have business transactions with women. It is a common occurrence for two men to lunch together in order to have a chance to talk over some important business without fear of interruption. There is no reason why a man and woman might not do the same, and yet how impossible it would be to convince the jealous woman that this was the case. To be jealous is to acknowledge the superior charms of the ...
— Herself - Talks with Women Concerning Themselves • E. B. Lowry
... daughter Came tripping on the waye; And there by chance a knighte shee mett, Which ...
— Book of Old Ballads • Selected by Beverly Nichols
... without baptism. So he was; all things are possible with God; and notwithstanding all that God has said in his Word about baptism and its blessed followings, I boldly say to you that if you die knowing as little about it as the thief on the cross did, with no better chance to have it administered upon you and to you than he had, God will never require it at your hands. But from this day on, if not before this day, you are lifted out of the darkness that encompassed his mind, and can nevermore plead ignorance. ...
— Life and Labors of Elder John Kline, the Martyr Missionary - Collated from his Diary by Benjamin Funk • John Kline
... and a dozen men had to brave such a charge as we met last night he would stand a very good chance of having his detachment wiped ...
— Uncle Sam's Boys in the Philippines - or, Following the Flag against the Moros • H. Irving Hancock
... in my mind, but I have found no chance to begin with the actual writing. I was sick of late, ...
— The House of the Vampire • George Sylvester Viereck
... nails, enamel his teeth, polish his eyes, and alter the shape of any of his joints which they think unsightly. During this operation they often stand seven or eight deep round a customer, fighting for a chance to ...
— Literary Lapses • Stephen Leacock
... constitution or government badly administered, there was no doubt but that they proposed to push nullification to the point of active resistance within what they considered their legal rights. They had also proposed a set of amendments which they knew stood no chance of meeting with approval from any number of the states. Moreover the Hartford Convention, whatever its intentions, seriously alarmed and embarrassed the Administration. Because of the consequences of their policy, its ...
— The Development of Religious Liberty in Connecticut • M. Louise Greene, Ph. D.
... at a good pace, as if he enjoyed being alive. Dr. Morton watched him, dreading to have to tell him the bad news and wondering how he would take it. "It's a pity," he thought, "Sherm's a fine manly fellow and ought to have his education and a chance at life, and I am afraid this means ...
— Chicken Little Jane on the Big John • Lily Munsell Ritchie
... 'Are you by chance disengaged to-morrow? Could you dine with me? I shall be alone; perhaps you don't mind that? We could exchange views on "fate, ...
— Born in Exile • George Gissing
... what you will; it makes no difference. The chance of making a good operation was before you, and you did not improve it. You will never get along at your ...
— Heart-Histories and Life-Pictures • T. S. Arthur
... method in this for it to be taken as the result of mere chance—chance again being but another illustration of Nature's love of a contradiction in terms; for everything is chance, and nothing is chance. And you may take it that all is chance or nothing chance, according ...
— Life and Habit • Samuel Butler
... people. Froude's books were certainly much easier to read than Freeman's. Must they therefore have been much easier to write? Two-thirds of Froude's mistakes would have been avoided, and Freeman would never have had his chance, if the former had had a keener eye for slips in his proof-sheets, or had engaged competent assistance. When he allowed Wilhelmus to be printed instead of Willelmus, Freeman shouted with exultant glee ...
— The Life of Froude • Herbert Paul
... distinct proposals of marriage that day, nearly all of which were renewed on subsequent occasions. It can only have been for the barest fraction of a minute that any gentleman could find himself alone with her. But, whenever any one did get the chance, he must have jumped at ...
— Brighter Britain! (Volume 1 of 2) - or Settler and Maori in Northern New Zealand • William Delisle Hay
... and Tarleton's dislike of him grew into hatred. Gentle, unassuming, and sensitive, he had never so far encountered an individual like Sir Matthew Bale, who outraged all his finer feelings and susceptibilities a dozen times a day. And the secretary swore between his teeth that if he ever got the chance of tripping him up, once the committee was done with, he would take good care not to ...
— War-time Silhouettes • Stephen Hudson
... alive to the fact that copious draughts of fresh air,—of air fresh and unaccustomed,—will have precisely the same effect. We do know that now and again it is very essential to "change the air;" but we generally consider that to do that with any chance of advantage, it is necessary to go far afield; and we think also that such change of the air is only needful when sickness of the body has come upon us, or when it threatens to come. We are seldom aware that ...
— He Knew He Was Right • Anthony Trollope
... culprit comes whose crime merits hanging; and the strict-minded Max must abdicate, for his conscience will not permit the dooming of any son of Adam to die. A strict-minded, strait-laced man! A man unfit for Revolutions? Whose small soul, transparent wholesome-looking as small ale, could by no chance ferment into virulent alegar,—the mother of ever new alegar; till all France were grown ...
— The French Revolution • Thomas Carlyle
... may be the son of a general and yet have no talent for command. A man may be of a good family and yet possess no other merit than that which he owes to chance,—the ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... my position afforded me not the slightest dismay. On the contrary, I think my feelings were rather of relief. I had not known whither I should repair—so distraught was my mood—and now chance had settled the matter for me by decreeing that I ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini
... once put in for a trifling offence, and nearly starved to death before he got out. "You will be sure to go there, Manuel," said he, "for they make no distinction; and if a man's a foreigner, and can't speak for himself, he'll stand no chance at all. I'd give 'em the slip afore I'd suffer such another ...
— Manuel Pereira • F. C. Adams
... over her, despite his reassuring smile and light badinage, realized with alarm that his patient was in great danger, that there was but a fighting chance ...
— Jolly Sally Pendleton - The Wife Who Was Not a Wife • Laura Jean Libbey
... breakfast," he said, "you asked me what I should do, and I had no chance to reply. Well, they were talking of it in the vestry just now, and I've made up my mind. I shall write to-night to the Bishop ...
— Simon Called Peter • Robert Keable
... rank or social prominence in England, should have been accepted as leaders in the colony shows that the best class of settlers were of comparatively humble extraction. Had many men of gentle blood come to Virginia during the first half of the 17th century there would have been no chance for the "merchant" class to acquire ...
— Patrician and Plebeian - Or The Origin and Development of the Social Classes of the Old Dominion • Thomas J. Wertenbaker
... prey is chiefly of the antelope species, the swiftest animals on earth; and what chance would he have, if he were to give one of his magnanimous roars to announce his approach? He knows his business better; he crouches in the rank grass and reeds by the sides of the paths made by the animals to descend to the rivers and pools to drink, and ...
— The Mission • Frederick Marryat
... this and to-morrow morning you could put together the necessary number of words to fill the space allotted to you, what kind of a thing do you think that story would make? It would be a mere raving like that other precious effort of August. The public, if by some odd chance it ever reached them, would think your mind was utterly gone; your reputation would go with that verdict. On the other hand, if you do not have the story ready by to-morrow, your hold on the Idler will ...
— Ghosts I have Met and Some Others • John Kendrick Bangs
... so clearly; never before, this has been presented so irrefutably; truly, the heart of every Brahman has to beat stronger with love, once he has seen the world through your teachings perfectly connected, without gaps, clear as a crystal, not depending on chance, not depending on gods. Whether it may be good or bad, whether living according to it would be suffering or joy, I do not wish to discuss, possibly this is not essential—but the uniformity of the world, that everything which happens is connected, that the great and the small things are all encompassed ...
— Siddhartha • Herman Hesse
... no one of the royal heroes of England that enjoys a more enviable reputation than the bold outlaw of Barnsdale and Sherwood. His chance for a substantial immortality is at least as good as that of stout Lion-Heart, wild Prince Hal, or merry Charles. His fame began with the yeomanry full five hundred years ago, was constantly increasing for two or three ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 1, Issue 2, December, 1857 • Various
... no chance of escape, he was surrounded and captured, and bound, and the Trojans, rejoicing greatly, dragged him back a prisoner to their camp on Plymouth Hoe. Here, although he was carefully guarded, he was treated with great kindness, fed bountifully, ...
— Cornwall's Wonderland • Mabel Quiller-Couch
... and government authorities missed the main chance to help the soldiers in North Russia and gain their most loyal service in the expedition. Truth, not silence with its suspected acquiescence with British propaganda and methods of dealing with Russians; truth not rumors, truth, was needed; not vague ...
— The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki - Campaigning in North Russia 1918-1919 • Joel R. Moore
... had been forced. It was now possible for troops to advance along the causeway. This had, however, been broken in various places by the enemy. The sappers and miners hastened forward to repair it. While this was being done, the cavalry had to wait in mad impatience, knowing that their chance lay in the plains beyond. As soon as the road was sufficiently repaired to allow them to pass in single file, they began struggling along it, and emerged at the other end of the causeway in twos ...
— The Story of the Malakand Field Force • Sir Winston S. Churchill
... misses it," I said to myself; "it will be frightened and vicious, and strike at him, and if he is bitten I shall be obliged to attack it then, and I shall not have such a chance as he has, for the head will be ...
— Mass' George - A Boy's Adventures in the Old Savannah • George Manville Fenn
... his acquaintance accidentally; the chance which led to it was caused by the peculiar conditions of the Yakut spring. My readers will probably only have a very imperfect knowledge ...
— Selected Polish Tales • Various
... Holiday; "for in one or two trials made by chance passengers coming along to such a place, the result must depend much more on chance ...
— Rollo in Paris • Jacob Abbott
... being taken out, save for the purpose of having his bed cleansed or renewed. His owner had previously made up his mind to have him destroyed; understanding, however, from me, that there still remained a chance of his recovery, he ordered his groom to procure a proper basket, and see that the dog's confinement was such as I had prescribed. The man asked me to allow him to have his kennel, which, being no larger than was requisite for him, I did ...
— The Dog - A nineteenth-century dog-lovers' manual, - a combination of the essential and the esoteric. • William Youatt
... doubt, a comparable level of prejudice among its commanders and men. At the same time, the Air Force was a new service, its organization still fluid and its policies subject to rapid modification. In such circumstances a straightforward appeal to efficiency had a chance to succeed where an idealistic call for justice and fair play might well ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.
... Tsar at last, "we will leave it to chance. Take your bows and arrows and come with me into the courtyard. You shall each shoot an arrow, and in whatever places your arrows fall, there shall you take ...
— Tales of Folk and Fairies • Katharine Pyle
... back to the times of William the Conqueror or Charlemagne, with only such outfit of the world's goods as might survive a 3,000-mile voyage in frail canoes, reenforced by such flotsam of the world's metallic stores as the tides of ocean might chance to bring them—and, with such limited capital to start with in life, what, should we judge, would have been the outcome of the experiment in religion, in morals, in art, in mechanics, in civilization, or in the production of materials for literature, as compared ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson
... weaving of the Fates. The giving of the lots, the weaving of them, and the making of them irreversible, which are ascribed to the three Fates—Lachesis, Clotho, Atropos, are obviously derived from their names. The element of chance in human life is indicated by the order of the lots. But chance, however adverse, may be overcome by the wisdom of man, if he knows how to choose aright; there is a worse enemy to man than chance; this enemy is himself. He who was moderately fortunate in the number ...
— The Republic • Plato
... Belisarius, blind and old, and a pensioner on the bounty of strangers, he lived on, eight weary years, in Rome. O'Doherty, enclosed in his native peninsula, between the forces of the Marshal Wingfield and Sir Oliver Lambert, Governor of Connaught, fell by a chance shot, at the rock of Doon, in Kilmacrenan. The superfluous traitor, Nial Garve, was, with his sons, sent to London, and imprisoned in the Tower for life. In those dungeons, Cormac, brother of Hugh O'Neil, and O'Cane also languished out their days, victims to the careless ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... pig of these pigs, and he is rooting up the ground now like any one of them; and whoever he is, he is no friend to us." "That is bad for us," said the other two, "for the pigs belong to some one of the Tuatha de Danaan, and even if we kill them all, the Druid pig might chance to escape us in ...
— Gods and Fighting Men • Lady I. A. Gregory
... almost leaped forward, but a tightness in his temples stopped him. The distance was too great. And the Jovian must be somewhere about! Quick surprise was his only chance. His gaze roved up to the steepening cliff behind the village, and ...
— One Purple Hope! • Henry Hasse
... after Mr. Anthony's appeal to the Southern Senators, a motion was made by Mr. Collamer to postpone the Crittenden Resolutions and take up the Kansas Admission Bill. Here was the chance at once offered to them to respond to that appeal—to make a first step, as it were. They would not make it. The motion was defeated by 25 yeas to 30 nays—Messrs. Benjamin and Slidell of Louisiana, Hemphill and Wigfall of Texas, Iverson of Georgia, and ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan
... not, nor advance Success or failure that's to be; All fortune, being born of chance, Is bastard-child ...
— Myth and Romance - Being a Book of Verses • Madison Cawein
... or to beat them by piling terror on terror, horror on horror. At that period the latest word in the theatre was melodrama of the wildest sort, and a play which did not contain a few murders, ghosts, enchanted woods and haunted castles had not the faintest chance of success. According to Wagner's own account he made a handsome bid for success; for nearly all the dramatis-personae came to an untimely end, and a spectre told one, not yet finished off, that if he moved another step his nose would then ...
— Richard Wagner - Composer of Operas • John F. Runciman
... wash themselves, while their apartments were perfumed with frankincense and lime-juice. Before dinner they were amused after the manner of their country; instruments of music were introduced; the song and the dance were promoted; games of chance were furnished them; the men played and sang, while the women and girls made fanciful ornaments from beads, with which they were plentifully supplied. They were indulged in all their little fancies, ...
— The History of the Rise, Progress and Accomplishment of the - Abolition of the African Slave-Trade, by the British Parliament (1839) • Thomas Clarkson
... I have been all along itching for a chance to carry it out. You were to give me the nigger's body for dissecting purposes, in return for which I was to give you a keg of my best ...
— Imperium in Imperio: A Study Of The Negro Race Problem - A Novel • Sutton E. Griggs |
