"Mariner's compass" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... man claims to have established these three independent truths, which are about as remote from each other as the discovery of the law of gravitation, the invention of printing, and that of the mariner's compass, unless the facts in their favor are overwhelming and unanimous, the question naturally arises, Is not this man deceiving himself, ...
— Medical Essays • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
... were trained to trot blindfold on a tread-mill in which there was no possibility of progress. Had the mind of the nation been left free and encouraged to exert its force, who can doubt that the country that produced the mariner's compass might have given birth to a Newton ...
— The Awakening of China • W.A.P. Martin
... nothingness, or been borne towards the ocean of eternity, by the swiftly destructive gulf of time,—an empire whose people have materially contributed to advance the civilization of Europe and America, by the discovery of the most useful arts and sciences, such as writing,[3] astronomy, the mariner's compass, gunpowder, sugar, silk, porcelain, the smelting and combination of metals,—and, in fine, enjoying within its own territories all the necessaries and conveniencies, and most of the luxuries of life; standing, as it proudly asserts, in no need of intercourse with other countries,[4] ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Vol. XIX. No. 541, Saturday, April 7, 1832 • Various
... straw hat, and steering the canoe by the bright reflection of the sun on its cedar deck, which was of course by no means so unpleasant as the beams of light glancing from the water itself. Surely it would not be impossible to make the needle of a mariner's compass itself steer the ship at least within half a point. The motion of the needle could connect one or the other of two electro currents, and so set in instant action a powerful purchase to ...
— The Voyage Alone in the Yawl "Rob Roy" • John MacGregor
... paper, printing and engraving, improved glass and steel, gunpowder, clocks, telescopes, the mariner's compass, the reformed calendar, the decimal notation; algebra, trigonometry, chemistry, counterpoint (an invention equivalent to a new creation of music); these are all possessions which we inherit from that which has so disparagingly ...
— Mutual Aid • P. Kropotkin
... brain-power and acumen. They could hardly proceed further without those finer instruments which we possess, but which they did not. Though they knew of certain magnifying glasses, they had no real telescopes or microscopes, no mariner's compass or chronometers, no very delicate balances. They possessed a magnificent thinking apparatus and put it to admirable use. The modern scientist has generally nothing but admiration for their keen insight, and for the brilliant hypotheses which they invented and which were ...
— Life in the Roman World of Nero and St. Paul • T. G. Tucker
... second-hand, shews them their uses, and points out the dots which mark the minutes, and the figures which divide it into hours, makes them count the seconds, and soon tell the hour. No. 4 then gives the class to No. 5 monitor, who has at his post a representation of the mariner's compass; he explains its uses, shews them the cardinal points, tells them how it was discovered, and then he will move the hands around, beginning at the north, and making the children repeat as he moves the hands, north, north-north-east, north-east, ...
— The Infant System - For Developing the Intellectual and Moral Powers of all Children, - from One to Seven years of Age • Samuel Wilderspin
... of the harbor, was extremely grand. For some time the voyage went on very prosperously, but at length the sky gradually became overcast, and the wind began to blow, and finally a great storm came on before the ships had time to seek any shelter. In those days there was no mariner's compass, and of course, in a storm, when the sun and stars were concealed, there was nothing to be done but for the ship to grope her way through the haze and rain for any land which might be near. The violence of the wind and the raging of the sea was ...
— Richard I - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott
... portrait of him taken by one of his pupils, E. Bradley. There is also a specimen of his writing, the Lord's Prayer inscribed within a circle about the size of a shilling. There is also in existence "a mariner's compass," most accurately drawn by ...
— The Parish Clerk (1907) • Peter Hampson Ditchfield
... he continued, producing a little mariner's compass; "and now be careful. You ought to have had three. Good-bye, boys. Back within the ...
— The Dingo Boys - The Squatters of Wallaby Range • G. Manville Fenn
... carriages, on which the movable arm of the figure of a man continually pointed to the south, as a guide by which to find the way across the boundless grass plains of Tartary; nay, even in the third century of our era, therefore at least 700 years before the use of the mariner's compass in European seas, Chinese vessels navigated the Indian Ocean* under the direction of magnetic needles pointing to ...
— COSMOS: A Sketch of the Physical Description of the Universe, Vol. 1 • Alexander von Humboldt
... multiplication of books, in triumphs over the forces of Nature, in those discoveries and inventions which abridge the labors of mankind and bring races into closer intercourse,—especially by such wonders as are wrought by steam, gas, electricity, gunpowder, the mariner's compass, and the art of printing,—the modern world feels its immense superiority to all the ages that have gone before. And yet, considering the infancy of science and the youth of nations, more was accomplished by the ancients for the ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume III • John Lord
... conduct of his great poem, may be represented under the same image, his symbolizing purpose being his mariner's compass:— ...
— Literary Remains (1) • Coleridge
... "I know the Mariner's Compass by heart," called in Mabel Blake from the rear line. "Brother Jack tested me, and he said I could sail an ocean liner with my knowledge," ...
— The Girl Scout Pioneers - or Winning the First B. C. • Lillian C Garis
... I see her? Only when my soul for an instant is clear from all earthly and gross obstruction; and how seldom I can attain to this result while weighted with my body! But she is near me—that I know—faithful as the star to the mariner's compass!" ...
— A Romance of Two Worlds • Marie Corelli
... field, roads have first painfully to be made. Man's definitive conquest of the sea dates from the middle of the fifteenth century when, by improvements in the art of sailing and by the extended use of the mariner's compass, it first became possible to undertake long voyages with assurance. These discoveries are associated with the name of Prince Henry of Portugal, whose life-long ambition it was, to quote the words engraved on his monument at the ...
— Progress and History • Various |
