Sentence Examples:
One need not be a diplomatist to realize the amazement of "the Rumanian government" on receiving this abrupt behest.
Such instructions no more make for easiness of attitude than the photographer's behest to "look natural"; and in a creature as unconscious as poor Dorset of the appearance he habitually presented, the struggle to maintain a pose was sure to result in queer contortions.
These acts, connected with the corrupting system of party discipline, introduced by that administration, with the view of compelling private judgment to succumb to the behest of the party, completely separated me from the administration of Andrew Jackson.
"You have a very obedient disposition, madam," he answered in a scornful manner, "and I doubt not have attended with a like readiness to the behest to favor the elder brother's suit as to that which forbade the receiving of the younger brother's addresses."
Stein, proscribed by Napoleon, forsaken by his king, who sacrificed him at the emperor's behest, is living in exile, deprived of his whole property, which Napoleon confiscated; he is without employment, without influence, far from his country, far from his friends.
The Wood-carver durst not refuse the behest of the Khan; but obtained an interval of seven days in order to collect the materials and instruments of his calling, but also to consider and find out a means of avenging the astuteness of the Painter.
Therefore, as among those who desire to understand them there are many more illiterate than learned, it follows that the Latin would not have fulfilled this behest as well as the vulgar tongue, which is understood both by the learned and the unlearned.
This testamentary behest and acknowledgment, in connection with other manifestations, and the absence of proof to the contrary, has caused the belief to be general among his biographers, early and late, that the fruit of this intimacy, Ferdinand Columbus, was an illegitimate offspring.
An old ballad has lately been found, which arranges in rhyming order the whole catalog of names and qualities of the distinguished people whose lives were forfeited by his hand, or at his behest, which served the people to perpetuate their detestation of his character.
"Your Electoral Highness, it has never entered the minds of our citizens to oppose themselves obstinately to the most gracious of sovereigns," protested the spokesman of the burger deputation, "On the contrary, we have always been found ready to obey the behests of your Electoral grace."
He is attended by a number of young pages, with rope turbans on their heads, who are seen rushing about in every direction to obey his behests, and directly a wife or courtier offends the despot, rush upon the unhappy individuals and drag them off to immediate execution.
It was an affecting sight to watch the tottering gait of those on whose heads the snows of many winters had drifted heavily, as they meekly obeyed the behest of one whose coarse nature forbade her sympathizing with them in their clouded age, and many infirmities.
Doubtless she thought of the magic goblet, now melted, which had constrained him to cast aside honor, fame, and power, as worthless rubbish, in order to obey her behest not to leave her; but though this remembrance burdened her soul, it had no decisive influence.
Those alone are happy whom nature has favored with some superfluity of intellect, something beyond what is just necessary to carry out the behests of their will; for it enables them to lead an intellectual life as well, a life unattended by pain and full of vivid interests.
It was one thing to read of one or another being sentenced to death, but quite another to behold a woman, strong in possession of, and desire for life, fated to be swung into eternity before many days because of circulating a false note at the behest of a paramour.
He mistrusts everything that he cannot pick to pieces on the spot and analyze, and though he is willing to be amused, beguiled, or even temporarily inspired by appeals to his imagination or emotions, he puts his doubts or qualms aside next morning at the behest of business.
Nevertheless, the tragedians and Pindar disobeying our behests, although they acknowledge that Asclepius was the son of Apollo, say also that he was bribed into healing a rich man who was at the point of death, and for this reason he was struck by lightning.
Thenceforward the English-speaking states might influence her overt acts, compel submission to their behests, and generally exercise a sort of guardianship over her, because they are the dispensers of economic boons, but the union of hearts, the mutual trust, the cement supplied by common aims are lacking.
"And I surely need not add that it would be the first and most sacred point of honor with this candidate to serve his party in every thing, to be the unswerving advocate of all its measures, and implicitly obedient to all its behests," said General Belch.
Even Aunt Delia McCormick, good Methodist as she was, who "put up" a little elderberry wine each year for communion purposes, was thought by more than one to strain near to the breaking point the third branch of that concise behest to "Touch not, taste not, handle not!"
Of the agents in this vast scheme of territorial aggrandizement, we see Cortez dying in obscurity, and Pizarro assassinated in his palace, while retributive justice has overtaken the monarchy at whose behests the richest portions of the western continent were violently wrested from their native possessors.
In a word, a wife has complete possession and control over any property she may possess, as well as over her earnings; the husband, on the other hand, is liable to confiscation of capitalized property or earnings at the behest of the law courts in favor of his wife.
Sympathy with and capacity to promote new ideas are essential to her progress, but only by allegiance to the eternal feminine, to the behests of love and motherhood and beauty of imagination, can the development of society on the lines of a broader and wiser humanity be effectually established.
Advertise them and see what they will bring, seemed to be the only law of production, at whose behest the most delicate webs and traceries of fancy, the most solemn and tender mysteries of feeling, the most awful of religious emotions came to have a trademark and market value!
The whole world was being thrilled and shocked by the unspeakable acts of these blonde beasts who, at the behest of their arrogant Kaiser, had simply become hordes of savages, and whose atrocious acts could only be compared with those of the troops of African wilds.
And then, to what, unless it be to the electric fluid, are we to attribute the magic by which the Will enthrones itself so imperiously in the eye to demolish obstacles at the behest of genius, thunders in the voice, or filters, in spite of dissimulation, through the human frame?
For this cause, we, who till this present, have sworn fealty to no man, submit ourselves, our lands, our families, our followers, to the protection and defense of your Majesty, and of free will and deliberate purpose we promise to obey your Majesty's orders and commands in all honest behests.
Rough as his soldiery were, they were not entirely freed from old superstitions, and there was not one hardy enough to obey his behest; so, after censuring them for lukewarmness in a blessed cause, he himself seized a sledgehammer from a bystander, and prepared to perform the sacrilegious act.
He regarded or at least treated them as no less worthy of a hearing and of being taken into conference than the President himself; and despite his protests he concluded the sorry performance by practically ousting President Palma and his cabinet at the behest of these lawless insurgents.
Ah, fair vision of humanity to come: man and woman side by side, sweet, serene, true, simple, natural, fulfilling earth's and heaven's behests, unashamed, unsophisticated, unaffected, each to each and for each, children of one mother, inheritors of a like destiny, and, at the last, artificers of an equal fate.
In this connection why may it not be intimated that a judge who pollutes his high office at the behest of the money power has the hinges of his knees lubricated with oil from the tank of the corporation that thrift may follow humiliating obedience to its commands?
I was still entirely eager to "do her behest in pleasure or in pain"; but this particular enterprise I was beginning to view apart from its inspiration, on its intrinsic demerits, and the more clearly I saw it in its own light, the less pleasure did the prospect afford me.
For all covered with gore as he was, he again seated himself at table, swearing that though he had a thousand horses or wives, or servants, if they refused to do his behest, he would kill them all; and he again began to look around him, holding his sword in his hand.
Unlike most of his contemporaries, he sturdily refused to change his religious views at the capricious behests of any monarch, and, strange to say, he does not seem to have suffered for his constancy materially, for he continued in official employment and the favor of Elizabeth as long as the Queen lived.
They thought that in the absence of any official order, and in view of the fact that they had been allowed to carry out the behest of their constituents, they were justified in thinking they had not contravened any official rule, since no intimation of such had been conveyed to them.
In the course of this development the faculty of inhibition grows stronger and more efficient and obeys the behests of the understanding more and more swiftly, surely and reliably; it can reach a pitch of invincibility against which all the revolts of instinct, all the storms of passion, are powerless.
Now, Henry, irritating and faithless as his conduct had always been, was not personally disliked, and the sight of their monarch led about like a captive and forced to obey every behest of his captors, was very displeasing to many who had formerly felt no sympathy for him.
The halls and galleries of the Louvre were crowded with animated and obsequious courtiers, and the apartments of Marie herself thronged by the greatest and proudest in the land; all of whom appeared, upon so joyous an occasion, to have laid aside their personal animosities and to live only to obey her behests.
Towards the explanation of this statement, which is no theoretical postulate, it must be remembered that no other class of instincts has required so vast a suppression at the behest of civilization as the sexual, whilst their mastery by the highest psychical processes are in most persons soonest of all relinquished.
Many more bitter remarks were made, and finally I was kicked out of the village as a rogue and vagabond, and glad enough to hurry back that I may lay my sword and services at your feet, fair ladies, right willing to do your behests in any way you may command me.
In their haste and eagerness they did not all obey my behest, but the most part did, so that the vessels, when they drew in under, were assailed by a tempest of missiles which did much execution, and sent one of the frail barks of hide topsy-turvy to the bottom.
In the eyes of many he seemed a greater criminal than even Burke and Hare, and outspoken and unthinking people went the length of declaring that these misguided men were but instruments in his hands, obeying his behests, and receiving pay for what their master knew to be murderous work.
Hattie, who had got religion on several unforgettable occasions and was at this very time on the point of returning to the spiritual fold which she had more or less secretly abandoned at the behest of the flesh, regarded this as an excellent opportunity to re-establish herself as a disciple of salvation.
Practice, somehow, always seems at war with theory, and it is not by any means an unusual occurrence for a lady, after having deliberately told her banker not to pay cash for her check to the presenter, to indignantly inquire why he did not disobey her behest and do so.
It already holds an almost omnipotent sway over the wealthier, or what they call the higher, classes of society, who hesitate at no sins that can be committed with its sanction; and the disposition is every day growing stronger and stronger, among all classes, to fall in with its behests.
Which always implies imperfect respect for the authority, however displeasing its behest, the teacher or parent should always reply, "You cannot understand why yet," unless quite sure that a convincing and controlling insight can be given, such as shall make all future exercise of outward authority in this particular unnecessary.
At the bidding of powers that even they could hardly visualize, at the behest of world politics that not one in a thousand would understand and scarcely any justify, houses were being broken up, women were weeping, and children playing in the sun before cottage doors were even now being left fatherless.
Never had Ernest executed a lady's behests with a worse grace, nor was his alacrity increased by perceiving that, ere he had even had time to cross the room, his place was already occupied, as much apparently to the satisfaction of his substitute, as to that of the faithless fair one herself.
The emperor instantly sent letters commanding the Milanese to make full reparation to their unfortunate neighbors; but on perusal of his behests they tore the missives in a thousand pieces, and flung them in the faces of the messengers, sending back by them as their sole answer an open defiance of his authority.
And then the idea shot like fire through his brain, that all his power to obey the dear behest hung upon the sagacity of the youth who was now tracing the steps of an enemy, skilled in all the wiles of Indian warfare, and whose object it clearly was to baffle pursuit.
While I performed these smiling behests, she sat brushing a branch of heliotrope across her lips, exclaiming at the beauty of the scene from an opposite window, and behaving generally like an empress who had honored her subjects with a visit, and was resolved to put them quite at ease in her presence.
Is it that the child is haled out of nothingness to be inoculated, perhaps, with germs of disease in the first instance and then half nourished for nine months in a body which has been robbed of its vitality by the mutilation and torture to which it has been subjected at the behest of fashion?
I agree that, if crimes which the good of society requires to be subjected to harsh penalties, must stand, always and irrevocably; upon the mere behest of judicial sentence, there would be found an oppression and a cruelty in some respects, that a community having a conscientious adherence to right and humanity would scarcely tolerate.
He was expressly enjoined to see that the law was carried to every man's door, without any distinction of persons; to submit himself to its behests, to watch against all impedimenta to the even flow of justice, to prevent false imprisonments, and to secure trials for every accused person by the local tribunals.
The really important fact was that a man who had been praetor seven years before and probably regarded himself as the greatest soldier of the age, was carrying out the behests and correcting the blunders of a general who owed his command to his aristocratic connections and blameless record in civil life.
The opal should assure me of my friend's fealty, the invisible slaves of the diamond should guard my fortunes, the serpent that cast its harmful eye on me would be blinded by my emerald, for, in fine, I believe that vassal genii attend each gem, and obey the behests of him who holds it.
The study of the anatomy and action of the horse, so rich in suggestions, is naturally most desirable to the artist; happy he who, obliged by the brevity of life and the limitations of fortune, to make his studies conform to his "orders," finds himself justified by a national behest in entering on this department.
She looked up at him smilingly and trustingly, yet tremulous at the behest of that mysterious something that drove her to accept his caresses instead of spurning them, that made her quiver at his touch, like a wind-kissed aspen, and had her still the storm within her by giving it a storm to fight.
The heart of a woman will cling to her lover or husband in crime or obloquy, almost as strongly as the heart of a loving man will cling to, and protect, the woman he really loves, doing deeds of crime at her will, and, in fact, wrecking fortune, and health, and life at her behest.
When the unhappy insides had picked themselves up from the straw at the bottom of the coach, into which they had unceremoniously been thrown by the driver's prompt obedience to that behest, they found themselves covered with a pistol projected through the door, and were invited to deliver up their money and jewelry.
At the general election, which took place in 1790, the most scandalous means were adopted to secure a thoroughly subservient majority in the lower house; and, lest this should not be sufficient, new peers were created through corrupt influence, in order that the lords might not offer any opposition to the behests of the Castle.
Generally, we believe, the higher we are in position, the more masters we have to serve, and the less considerate; and we have little doubt that even our brilliant and gentle authoress herself has more and less amiable behests to obey, than ever fell to the lot of the independent help, who "thought she heard her yell."
Like a woman, and a young woman, she was resolved to run all risks in her friend's cause, deeming it ignoble to make any concession to William's unfounded jealousy, and not appreciating Felix's doubts of any young man, especially one in a chafing refractory mood, going back to the yoke at the behest of his sisters' governess.
Members of the House of Commons intervene, in the manner indicated, in mere matters of detail of administration, because they have not the courage to refuse to obey the behests of the political leaders of the civil service unions; they do not so interfere from the mere desire to promote their political fortunes by championing the interests of a class.
The worshipful members of the London companies sometimes choose to rest from their labors in a rural grave; and when they do, survivors are always to be found not unwilling to enjoy once a year a pensive holiday, coupled with the creature comforts, which the quiet comrade whose behest they execute has taken care to provide for them.
Fidelity possesses no doubt more the appearance of a moral character, inasmuch as it does not merely will its own but holds fast to something higher, something shared with itself, surrenders itself to another's will, whether it be the wish or behest of a master, and thereby renounces the personal desire and independence of its own particular volition.
For the rest, if anything in the career of Newman Chaytor came to his knowledge, and he could in any way carry out the behests of the man lying dead in the room beyond, he would do it, and thus vicariously make atonement for the villain who had brought sorrow and misery upon all with whom he came in contact.
Of late she not only looked but felt herself the elder of the two, and treated him as young ladies are sometimes inclined to treat boys, in a slightly dictatorial way, ordering him about, and expecting him to obey her slightest behest; as he was invariably obedient they never quarrelled, and she always appeared to receive his service as her right.
The baguettes were little rods of boxwood, placed between each finger and toe, touching the bone, and joined together with strings by an instrument so craftily designed that the executioner could, at the behest of the judge, squeeze all the fingers together, strip the bones of their flesh, grind them terribly, or give the victim only a slight pain.
It suffocated her; she felt that if it lasted another instant she must scream out, so frightful was the strain, and yet, when as though obeying an irresistible behest he came back upon his steps and put his hand upon her shoulder, she prayed for that silence to come back, anything rather than that he should speak to her.
And, as I obeyed that last behest with all my might, without a thought of what I was doing, save that he bade me do it, I saw his hands shoot up and his head bob down, and his lithe, spare body cut the sunset as cleanly and precisely as though he had plunged at his leisure from a diver's board!
When we think of the wives trampled on by husbands whom the law has taught them to regard as inferior beings, and of the mothers whose children are torn from their arms by the direct behest of the law at the bidding of a dead or living father, when we think of these things, our hearts ache with pity and indignation.
The civil condition of society being distinguished from the natural by the fact that in the first there is a distinct author of law, while in the last there is none, it appears as if the moment a number of units were acknowledged to obey no common sovereign or political superior they were thrown back on the ulterior behests of the Law Natural.
Britannia sending forth her messengers to every quarter of the globe, ships upon the sea with sails unfurled ready to obey her instant behests, the reindeer as the emblem of speed in the regions of snow, intercourse with the nations of the East and of the West, and the blessings of cheap postage in its social aspects, are all suitably depicted.
To fulfil the promise exacted from them, the administrators of the hospital, instead of supplying the simple funeral ordinarily accorded to the paupers who died there, responded liberally to the behest of their generous benefactor, and accompanied his interment with every mark of respect, after which they went to the office indicated to claim the inheritance bestowed on them.
Webster could not avoid admitting the force of the constitutional provisions about fugitive slaves, and was obliged to bow to their behest, yet to defend them without reservation, to attack those who opposed them, and to urge the rigid enforcement of a Fugitive Slave Law, was not in consonance with his past, his conscience, and his duty to his constituents.
Fashion might turn her attention to the back of the head, and forthwith waterfalls and chignons would appear at her behest, but Sibyl, while congratulating her friends upon the wonders they achieved, would still wind her thick golden braids in a classical coil, so that her head in profile brought up to the beholder's mind a vision of an antique statue.
Grace, however, viewed the matter differently; not that she attached anything discreditable to Rupert's compliance, for her own womanly tenderness, long and deeply rooted attachment, made it appear to her eyes more as an act of compliance with her own last behest, than as the act of degrading meanness it would unquestionably appear to be, to all the rest of the world.
Far better is it that the crimes of isolated individuals should continue than that crimes such as the cold-blooded infliction of torture and death committed at the behest of the State, as supposed to represent the whole of society, should attain their object, even though the object be the suppression of crimes of another kind perpetrated by the aforesaid individuals within society.
Seized and imprisoned at the behest of an adulterous woman whose sin he had rebuked, shut up in prison, his ministry ended, all his power for good taken away, and finally finishing his life under circumstances which mark more than any other could the contempt and indifference which the great gay world of his day had for goodness and greatness!
I suggest that those, to whom this right appears to be rooted in the very nature of things, and not to be a creation of the State, called into being at the behest of the social will in a certain stage of its development, should read and re-read what Sir Henry Maine has to say about testamentary succession, in his wonderful little book on "Ancient Law."
Besides, it was only the day before that Robert's remittance of one hundred dollars had come to him, and, in acknowledging its receipt, he had partially satisfied his resentment by telling his cousin "what he thought of him," and to learn now that the young man was in jail for the fault, and apparently at his behest, was sorely displeasing to him.
Agitated and discomfited, he knelt before the queen, and said, "I need no other rewards to induce me to serve your majesty than such as my ancestors have obtained in the service of your royal predecessors; but since it is your majesty's pleasure that I should have new motives and incentives for my zeal, I would crave to know in what way I may fulfil your majesty's behest?"
If the mind is manifested in such a way through the sensuous nature subject to its empire that it executes its behests with the most faithful exactitude, or expresses its sentiments in the most perfectly speaking manner, without going in the least against that which the aesthetic sense demands from it as a phenomenon, then we shall see produced that which we call grace.
The extent of the conspiracy had not as yet been revealed; but enough was known to the government to evince the fact that this was an act of deep political significance, having behind it a very different class of men from the dissolute and depraved assassins who were executing their behests, and not merely done for the gratification of personal and political revenge.
By tests like these, constituencies who sufficiently value mental ability, and eagerly seek for it, will generally succeed in obtaining men beyond mediocrity, and often men whom they can trust to carry on public affairs according to their unfettered judgment; to whom it would be an affront to require that they should give up that judgment at the behest of their inferiors in knowledge.
For it not only accepts and makes its own all the right or wrong that appears elsewhere, but it also remains true or becomes false to its own supreme duty and obligation to moral law, when, under the behests of conscience, it directs life and character either up the heights of moral excellence and happiness, or into the wrong and guilt and miseries of immorality.
The high behest to earn much, by and through grand opportunities to labor and direct labor, blossoms into blessing in its best sense only when the earnings are spent to increase the intelligence, add to the comforts, and aid men to discharge their private and public duties more nobly than it is possible for a man to do with an income that simply gives him bread.
At length, just as the curtain was rising, a young lady entered and took her seat in the much observed box, accompanied by a gentleman of venerable and patriarchal appearance; apparently an indulgent old uncle, a slave to the caprices of his pretty niece, who had renounced his comfortable after-dinner nap by the fire, in order to obey her behest and escort her to the theater.
The Baron made him a quick and scarcely perceptible sign; and by some accident the landlord quite forgot to obey the lady's behest, taking the opportunity of scolding his daughter for something that had gone amiss, and then aiding the rest of the party who were assembled in the kitchen to consume the remains of the supper which he had brought out of the neighboring room.
Finding all his efforts vain, Maurice resigned himself to the inevitable, whilst Gabrielle sadly prepared to obey the command of one to whose behests she had ever yielded a dutiful submission, comforting herself, perchance, with the secret hope that her love and fidelity to Maurice would be more cherished, and invested with a greater heroism in his eyes, after two long, weary years of trial and separation.
He scarce, indeed, would have drawn his sword at Ursula's behest, inasmuch as he could plainly see that what she had most at heart was to make their breach wear such seeming to other folks as though he, who had been looked upon by the whole city as her pledged husband, had not quitted her, but had been ready rather to shed his heart's blood in her service.
Individual resistance or even indifference to their behests occasioned very forcible applications to the heads and shoulders of any elector, and when they brought him to the hustings, his attention was invited to a reserved body specially stationed in the vicinity of the polling booths, from whom he was informed that he might expect very strong censures on his want of patriotism, if he voted on the wrong side.
Some men were supposed to be so rarely endowed that "a thousand liveried angels" waited on them invisibly, to execute their behests for the benefit of those they favored; while, much oftener, the perverse and crookedly disposed, who delighted in mischief, would bring on those to whom, for whatever capricious reason, they were hostile, calamities, which no sagacity could predict, and no merely human power could baffle and resist.
This is an undeniable fact; and once recognized does it not awake in us the presentiment of a directing law immanent in vital effort, a law doubtless not to be found in any code, nor yet binding through the stern behest of mechanical necessity, but a law which finds definition at every moment, and at every moment also marks a direction of progress, being as it were the shifting tangent to the curve of becoming?
It is the figure of a woman past the prime of life, nay, verging upon age, but who retains all the majesty and some remains of the beauty which distinguished her in bygone days; who even now owns none of the decay of strength or infirmity of gait which usually accompanies the advance of years, but who looks, as she always did, born to command, and not yet incapable of enforcing obedience to her behests.
The will which regulates the distribution of blood, when incited by a group of presentations temporarily predominating, thus resembles a servant who is constantly occupied in a room in carrying out the behests of his master: to light the gas in one place, in another to turn it up higher, in another to turn it off partly or wholly, so that at one moment this, and at another that, corner of the room becomes bright, dim, or dark.
Now to prohibit and prevent the shipment of munitions of war by an affirmative act on our part, at the behest and for the exclusive benefit of one of the countries now at war, without the consent of the nations adversely affected thereby, would be a violation of international law and would constitute a breach of neutrality on our part which would be indefensible from the standpoint of good faith and good friendship to all on our part.
The young knight who had brought the news looked at her with unmistakable admiration and pleasure, and seemed as though he would gladly have obeyed any behest of hers; but he was fain to wait for the decision of the stately Eleanor, the king's eldest and much-beloved child, who in the temporary absence of her parents occupied a position of no little importance in the household, and whose will, in the royal apartments at any rate, was law.
The whole duty of man is to live and work according to the highest laws of right made known to him, to walk according to the best light that has been shed about his path; and while Justice shall deny to every soul that has not rendered obedience to the law, entrance into the kingdom of the blessed, Mercy shall claim opportunity for all who, have shown themselves willing to receive the truth and obey its behests.