Sentence Examples:
A superintendent's report, written thirty years ago for one of the New England States, regrets that, even then, home government had grown lax.
Unfortunately, though, for Little Peter, his efforts and those of his band had been somewhat lax during the winter, and the catch they brought did not in all respects sustain his story.
What the majority of modern verse writers call "imagery," is not the product of imagination, but a restless pursuit of comparison, and a lax use of language.
She breakfasted in bed every day, served by Avery who was firm as to the amount of nourishment taken but comfortably lax on all other points.
The rules for allowing witnesses for the prosecution were lax; those for rejecting witnesses for the defense were rigid.
Nevertheless, even though the tribunals had been as strict as they were lax, the liability to a judicial reckoning could only check the worst evils.
In my work, I have encountered many sad instances of the result of lax moral principles; but I little thought to encounter the saddest of all in my own family.
His son is always lax as to dates, and often just at those periods when they would be the most welcome.
And so she rested, lax, murmuring about things that had happened, sometimes smiling faintly as she recalled them.
There is no term in political philosophy more ambiguous and lax in its meaning than Luxury.
With so devout a governor as Monsieur de Denonville, it might be an ill thing even in this world for the officers of his household to be lax.
The long, perfect limbs stretched out would have appeared lax and drunken but for their grace of line.
A moment he stood so, tense as a wire drawn to the point of breaking, ghastly tense; then of a sudden he went lax.
Franklin's lax business methods but have imagined the tenth of what he had to attend to, they would have been heartily ashamed of their complaints.
Be neither too lax nor too precise in your use of language: the one fault ends in stiffness, the other in slang.
It is a great, though very prevalent mistake, to imagine that boys and girls like a lax and inefficient government, and dislike the pressure of steady control.
The course above recommended is not trying lax and inefficient measures for a long time in hopes of their being ultimately successful, and then, when they are found not to be so, changing the policy.
He was a handsome child, large and fair, and as I lifted his white, lax fingers, a torrent of love swept through me, and I kissed him.
The common people did what seemed to them practicable and compatible with a somewhat lax conscience, and it was only the loser to whom it sometimes occurred to look up dusty old documents.
Perhaps a gay disposition and a lax education may have betrayed him into some scenes of dissipation.
This is a matter upon which I feel easier in my mind than upon any other, and yet a great many people look upon me as being very lax.
All her muscles were lax, and every full curve of her body tended downward in response to the negligent pose.
The thought will perhaps occur to the reader that Fox was not less lax than Sheridan, and yet for Fox Burke long had the sincerest friendship.
The muscles especially necessary for tennis were also, so far as possible, kept lax except at the instant for making the stroke.
They carried the spectator far away from the actual world to a region where society was more splendid and careless and brilliant and lax.
In my opinion people of today are more lax in their attitude toward marriage than they were in those days.
The dismissal call was given none too soon, for the curiosity as to what we were heading for made discipline lax and attention far from close.
If marital jealousy is less common among men than among women, the explanation is at hand in the lax moral standard for man.
He really had not much to do, although the rest put their burdens upon him, for discipline was so lax, that the loosest attendance answered equally well with the most conscientious.
Such was the system, but as no attack had taken place for some years the discipline had grown lax.
One of the songs (on the delights of bull-baiting) contains the most vigorous lines I have ever met, but they are too vigorous for our lax age.
The ordinary judges are lax in their duties, are not prompt in finishing the business of the advocates, and in fact, neglect this duty greatly.
Mary, lax and helpless enough on most matters concerning her daughter's conduct, held out on one point.
The state authorities began to realize that their lax methods of railway supervision were being used as an argument for increased Federal interference.
There is nothing so mean as to take the loaves and fishes of any post, and not to do its duties; to order others about, and to be lax with yourselves.
As a revolt against their own upbringing, they are either too firm in their control or too lax.
She left this place because the employer was very lax about payment, and sometimes cheated her out of small amounts.
They gave themselves, under the lax and indeterminate idea of the honor of the crown, a full loose for all manner of dissipation, and all manner of corruption.
On such occasions, in the somewhat lax administering of justice of those early times, the killing of a fellow creature seemed indeed a trifle light as air.
She was lax in discipline and saw to it that the boy had a better time while with her than he was likely to have when under his uncle's care.
I came to you first to complain, thinking that the department was lax leaving them around in the lecture hall.
He may reform lax discipline or incorrect observances, but apparently not of his own authority but merely as an executive power enforcing the opinion of the higher clergy.
The enforcement of the slave trade laws became notoriously lax and there was a tendency to make slave codes harsher.
"Mary, I fear her code of morality is somewhat too lax; and the fact that she acknowledges no fault is far more painful than any other circumstance."
She can afford to be lax with them, because even if they don't give money to her, she can get along without it.
The Indian made no other sound but merely rolled over on his back and lay very still, eyes shut, jaw dropping, hands lax at his sides.
They had been lax in their watch and careless of the future, faults frequent in irregular troops, but in the presence of overwhelming danger they showed not the least fear of death.
The hand was so cold and lax that even the smooth warmth of her soft fingers failed to put life in it.
Their fondness for hugging the coast was very noticeable to me, and, unused to the constant vigilance and care which a long sea voyage demands, their system of duty was very lax and careless.
If the number of females is large, manners are familiar, and morals are lax; if the number is small, manners are reserved, and morals severe.
A too lax condition of the digestion would indicate that an excessive amount was being fed.
Any excess of milk given at one time usually disturbs the digestion and is followed by too lax a condition of the bowels.
The country had never altogether recovered from the reaction of lax indifference into which it had fallen after the Restoration.
That lax morality and religious indifference prevailed more or less among all classes of society during this period, we learn from the concurrent testimony of writers of every kind and creed.
He takes things at once too easily and too hard; he is both too lax and too tense, too reckless and too ambitious, too cold and too passionate.
I do not love him less because he does not frown upon our wandering tribe, but has lax principles that suit the fiery passions of our race.
There is a general idea that the medical training is lax, and the doctors, as a rule, are not highly considered.
Of all classes it may be said that their manners are, on the whole, good, and their morals generally lax.
"So far," says he, "as we know, the most important, living, theological writers, of the present day, entertain this so-called more liberal or lax view, (namely, that of Luther.)"
They had neither the capacity to imagine nor the will to invent an incident, which, while embodying the loftiest of all moral teaching, would seem to them dangerously lax in its moral tendencies.
We have long known of the lax security measures in effect at this plant, and have, as a consequence, been expecting some disaster there.
The financial relations of the city treasury with other brokers before Frank had been very lax.
It is here that teachers are often very lax in dealing with the pupil in his various forms of expressive work.
As soon as the boy reaches the age at which he feels that he is a man, he ceases to be under paternal restraint, which even up to that age has been more or less lax.
Her parents heard with horror her freely expressed sentiments, and wondered where she had inhaled such lax ideas.
Lying with her golden head in her arms, the splendid shoulders lax, she felt a strong impulse toward the water shoot through her form from head to heel at this wet contact with the naked earth.
Discipline, both among officers and men, is sure to have become lax, and there will be much that young men, going freshly into the matter, will see needs amendment.
Wanda, lying white and lax upon the couch near the fireplace, suddenly dropped her mother's hand and sprang to her feet, her body quivering with a quick anger that leaped out to meet her father's.
Our laws were lax, and for a time nearly everybody, sane or insane, sound or diseased, was passed.
The greater obstacle is negative, it lies in the want of stimulus, in the lax prosperity of most of the constituent states of such a union.
It was easy to see that Graves became daily bolder, and more lax in training, and his influence upon several of the boys grew stronger.
Those were lax days, there was little examination, and a very low standard of fitness was required.
He grew lax in his tasks; he dragged his feet and there were even times when he was not hungry.
In a large woman with a lax abdomen, a properly made abdominal support will not only be a great comfort but of real advantage.
It came home to him that his opinions were stiff, whereas in comparison his effort was lax; and he accordingly began to wonder whether he might not make a living by his opinions.
Some days, when the guards were too watchful, I couldn't get very many, and then again when things were lax, 'Elijah's Raven' would get a kidney for each man in our mess.
When fed to horses that are working, some care must be exercised in feeding it, lest too lax a condition of the bowels should be induced, and a grain factor should be fed at the same time.
No one dared to be lax; for life hung on salary, and on zeal the continuance of the salary.
Thoreau had, in literature as in life, a code of his own, which, if sometimes lax where others were stringent, was always stringent in higher matters, where others were lax.
I used to use boxes in the cellar, with careful packing with forest leaves and somewhat careful attention to moisture conditions, with penalties for lax attention always enforced.
Isabel's arms hung lax and motionless: only her hands stirred, from the wrists, and so slightly, or else so rapidly without effort, that they too scarcely seemed to move.
The moral question afforded a good excuse, but the monasteries fell, not so much because their morals were lax, as because their position was weak.
He maintained discipline, which was quite lax in those days, by the exercise of this ability.
He worked the grip of the blaster under the alien's lax claws and inspected the result with the care of one arranging a special and highly important display.
According to their own accounts, discipline must have been extremely lax at first, but was now improving.
The cold cheek, the clay-cold lips, the long, lax limbs of the poor doll were at his service.
For instance, if the bowels get lax, as is the case in certain stages of disease, brandy is given as a remedy.
His temper became soured, and he was now often lax, sometimes unjust, and always irritable.
Suddenly something caught his attention; his whole lax figure grew braced again as he read a passage steadily through more than twice or thrice.
It is the culmination, indeed, of a sort of lax morality apt to grow out of the habits and traditions of the class.
It was a characteristic outfit with lax ideas in regard to laws which touched upon personal desires as to gambling, strong drink, Sunday trading and the rest.
"I have observed, too, that boys very generally prefer to see the strict companies, but perhaps they would prefer to belong to the lax ones."
Now and then, we have attempted to lift the veil, but we all have been lax and easily turned aside.
Now, with a forlorn outward gesture of the hands, and a lax dropping of them to either side, he stood awaiting judgment.
Looking where he pointed I discovered on a mound above the stream an old man sitting motionless as a statue, with bowed head, and lax hands.
It was said by some that police methods were very lax at that time, and that the saloons, which ought to be closed on election day, would be almost if not quite wide open.
When each monastery was independent and isolated it was impossible to reform a lax community, or for it to defend itself from feudal violence and the hostility of the secular clergy.
As a rule, however, too strict observance of the dictates of society in this connection is better than too lax.
Under the lax requirements, and probably still more lax enforcement, of the provisions for actual cultivation or cattle-raising, it was not difficult to hold such wild land.
All this ended, as running about and excitement generally does, with my lady being exhausted, and lax with fatigue.