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Definition of tenacity:

  • (noun) persistent determination

Sentence Examples:

From their tenacity of life, extraordinary powers of reproduction, and incalculable numbers, their united influence may be said to be far more important, in all the great operations of nature, than that of the larger and more perfectly developed organisms.

I came away more than ever impressed by the tenacity of feudal traditions, and the need of redoubled efforts on the part of all Radical stalwarts to convert the older universities from hotbeds of expensive obscurantism into free nurseries of humanitarian democracy.

Vincent, who, besides his aversion from the war in general, was distinguished rather by tenacity and resolution in meeting difficulties and dangers, when forced upon him, than by the sanguine and enterprising initiative in offensive measures which characterized Nelson.

That is a condition which often comes with whitening hair; and sometimes, too, an intense obstinacy and tenacity of rule, like the main trunk of an exorbitant egoism, conspicuous in proportion as the varied susceptibilities of younger years are stripped away.

Her sires had fought at Hastings, and from each line of ancestors she inherited totally distinct qualities of bravery, dogged resolution, intrepid pride, and tenacity of purpose, which, blended together, have produced the finest race the world has ever seen.

The descendants of pioneers cling with tenacity to the memories of olden times, and are proud of the historic struggles made by their ancestors to establish schools, churches, and good government in a wilderness known only to savage life for untold ages.

It affects also their physical properties, for it diminishes the tenacity of heavy clays; each straw as it decomposes forming a channel through which the roots of plants, air, and moisture can penetrate more readily than through the stiff clay itself.

They controlled the entire money market and trade of the East through their assiduous industry, mercantile sharpness, their lack of scruples, and the tenacity with which they held together, supported therein by their worship in common in the Synagogue.

The tenacity with which he held to neutrality in the face of intense provocation resulted less from his appreciation of the pacific sentiments of the nation, or a desire to assure its economic prosperity, than it did from his instinctive abhorrence of war.

Connected with these habits of mind, and in sooth forming part of them, we find a reverence for antiquity, and an inordinate tenacity of old opinion, old beliefs, and old habits, which remind us of those tropical civilizations which formerly flourished.

Though she could not remember ever having told a lie before, she adhered with rigid tenacity to the consequences of her first lapse from truth, and fortified her original statement with additional details whenever a questioner sought to take her unawares.

The public clung with really pathetic tenacity to what I believe were the direct traditions of the Great Exhibition of international vulgarity, traditions that were so appalling that the houses in which people lived were only fit for blind people to live in.

As might have been predicted, this venture was not more fortunate than his previous ones; and, after a year's endurance, diversified latterly with pecuniary squabbles, in which Hume's tenacity about a somewhat small claim is remarkable, the engagement came to an end.

It is astonishing to see with what tenacity children thus educated cling to the superstitions and absurdities of their fathers; and it is because their religion is wrought into the very texture of their minds, in the schools as well as in the churches.

His isolation from his coevals, and from those who offered resistance, was the necessary consequence of his force of character, and the moral tenacity which endured no encroachment on the narrow scheme of thought; over which it was incessantly brooding.

It was a development of native tradition, and although, like all other work of the time, it was influenced by Italian models, it retained its individuality with great tenacity, and in no other country can the same special development of design be found.

Our numerous passions, the complexities of our desires, the tenacity of their grasp, and the pleasant gentleness of its touch explain an infinity of temptations followed by willful successes in blindness, all of which are nothing less than guilty acts of self-deception.

If it arises from an inertia or indolence of the Solids, nervous medicines will best answer that indication; which, by stimulating the lazy inactive Fibers, will increase their elasticity, invigorate their contractions, accelerate the motion, and break the tenacity of the Blood.

By such conduct, we answer in some degree the expectations of those citizens in the several States who have shown so great a tenacity to the preservation of those rights and liberties they secured to themselves by an arduous, persevering, and successful conflict.

On the other hand, the tenacity of Icelandic tradition, the continuous interest in the poetic mythology, and the absence of any fanatical hatred of the old heathenism, make it possible to accept, with due reservations, many of the statements made in these writings.

The fine glacial scratches that are abundantly scattered over this quartzite indicate the tenacity with which it retains all such impressions, and will warrant the assignment of any date to these inscriptions that may be called for within the human period.

What generous divination, and that superiority in virtue which was thought by Cicero to give a man the best insight into nature, have failed to do, their spying and scraping, their deadly tenacity and almost diabolic cunning, will doubtless some day bring about.

It was ignominious to have to give way; but, after a moment's struggle with herself, she surmounted her dislike to being overruled, together with a certain unreasoning tenacity of opinion natural to her sex, and said, quietly: "What do you wish me to do?"

Again and again were the French repulsed, only to renew the onset with greater vigor and determination; but those five or six hundred Guardsmen were invincible in their dogged tenacity, and would not yield even when the buildings were blazing around them.

This general American experience is largely responsible for the tenacity with which we of this generation blindly conserve the liberal principles of our ancestors, even while we keep them, like the tables of the ten commandments, safe from the rude touch of practical experience.

You will, I trust, resemble a forest plant, which has indeed, by some accident, been brought up in the greenhouse, and thus rendered delicate and effeminate, but which regains its native firmness and tenacity when exposed for a season to the winter air.

With admirable tenacity the Italians held every position to the very limit of their power and gave up only against overpowering strength, giving way occasionally almost foot by foot, only to come back with strong counterattacks as soon as they regained their breath.

An inspiriting feature of this discovery was the wonderful tenacity of Lieutenant Kelly of the Scottish Horse, who, though wounded in the stomach at the onset, had no sooner located the enemy than he crawled under heavy fire to inform the officer commanding!

The infantry must have the tenacity to hold every advantage gained, the individual and collective discipline and skill needed to master the enemy's fire, the determination to close with the enemy in attack, and to meet him with the bayonet in defense.

The circumstances which mainly contribute to produce this extraordinary tenacity of error and insensibility to truth, in the majority of mankind at all times and under all circumstances, are their general indifference to distant effects, and their acute sense of present burdens.

Her delusions having thus become systematized, nothing shakes her tenacity in seeking to carry them out; she attempts at all costs to have relations with her confessor, embraces him, throws herself at his knees, pursues him, and so becomes a cause of scandal.

For the face combined too ill-assorted qualities: an obstinate tenacity that might even mean brutality, and was certainly repulsive, yet, with it, an undecipherable dreaminess betrayed by lines of the mouth, but above all in the very light blue eyes, so rarely raised.

The soil of the marshes or of the plains, separated from the pebbles and foreign substances which it contained, mixed with grass or chopped straw, moistened with water, and assiduously trodden underfoot, furnished the ancient builders with materials of incredible tenacity.

The process would assuredly be a long one, for men who fought so stoutly would resist starvation with equal tenacity; besides, the duration of the siege was already beginning to excite discontent among the allies, whose wars were generally of very short duration.

"I know no such unquestionable badge and ensign of a sovereign mind as that tenacity of purpose which, through all changes of companions, or parties, or fortunes, changes never, bates no jot of heart or hope, but wearies out opposition and arrives at its port."

I know no such unquestionable badge and ensign of a sovereign mind as that tenacity of purpose which, through all change of companions, or parties, or fortunes, changes never, bates no jot of heart or hope, but wearies out opposition and arrives at its port.

From the beginning of his work upon the Shaw memorial there had been bitter opposition upon the part of his friends to the symbolical figure hovering above Colonel Shaw and his men, but the sculptor clung to his original conception with great tenacity.

He was too English even to have taken the explanation, for he detested the distinguishing of the races in his country, and could not therefore have comprehended her peculiar tenacity of the sense of injury as long as enthusiasm did not arise to obliterate it.

Cast iron resembles a brick to a certain extent in opposing great resistance to being crushed compared to that which it offers to being pulled asunder, while wrought iron far excels the cast metal in tenacity, but is inferior to it in resistance to compression.

The tenacity with which arctic animals hold to life was frequently instanced in our experience, and the thought occurred that it arose from the survival of the strongest and hardiest individuals in a clime where nature ever seems at strife with nature's life.

The prejudices of the Americans against Russia and England have been to a great extent mitigated, and the grand, the noble attitude of the people of France, the tenacity and the heroism of her soldiers, have proved that France is far indeed from decadent.

American opinion has, within the last twenty years, run into the very opposite extreme, and now maintains with some tenacity the right even of barbarous communities to be let alone and allowed to work out their own salvation or damnation in their own way.

The wire does not appear to be made of iron, because it is galvanized or passed through melted zinc, which coats the surface and defends it from destructive rust, at the same time does not destroy its valuable property of tenacity or power of resisting a strain.

They have shown quickness of perception, promptness in decision, the courage and tenacity which every Briton glories in as his birthright, and a cheerfulness in the most adverse and depressing circumstances, which is not improvised, but grows out of health and disciplined freedom.

For ordinary surfaces of woodwork of a slightly rough or uneven character, two or three coats of the filling composition will suffice to produce, when carefully rubbed down, a perfectly smooth surface of a hard metallic nature, combined with great tenacity and durability.

Displaying wonderful courage and tenacity at the critical times, he was the only officer of his battalion who advanced beyond the town and, by clearing machine gun and sniping posts, contributed largely to the aid of his battalion in holding its objective.

Her affection and respect were clinging with new tenacity to her godfather, and with him to those memories of her father which were in the same opposition to the division of men into sheep and goats by the easy mark of some political or religious symbol.

From an observation point in the village I studied the ground of the day's fighting, and though familiar with Russian courage and tenacity, I found it difficult to realize that human beings had been able to carry the positions which the Russians carried here.

The Government have brought forward their measure in a very positive way, and have clung to it with great tenacity, rejecting all compromise; they have been abandoned by nearly half their supporters, and nothing can exceed their chagrin and soreness at being so forsaken.

Of these, Hinduism alone would seem to be a truly indigenous faith, or one wholly in harmony with the instincts of the rural population; and it is impossible for a traveler not to be struck with the tenacity of the ancient superstitions which are its groundwork.

A mysterious people that never advanced in the art of building, but clung tenaciously, as the bee, the bird, the spider, and the ant, to traditional usage in the structure of their dwellings, and which clung with like tenacity to the cult of ancestors.

He seemed everywhere along his extended lines, and his tenacity and deep-set resolution, his inmost courage, which appeared to swell with the growing peril to the army, undoubtedly stimulated the troops to greater action, and held them in place despite all weakness.

Nothing is so irresistible as a tyrannical power commanding in the name of the people, because, whilst it exercises that moral influence which belongs to the decision of the majority, it acts at the same time with the promptitude and the tenacity of a single man.

The doctor felt sure, by the expression which passed over his features from time to time, that something was worrying and oppressing him; something which he wished to communicate, and had not the force, or the tenacity of purpose, to make perfectly clear.

Such was the terrain which was to see so much hard fighting; a land held by a keenly patriotic and high-spirited people, possessed of great tenacity of purpose, and especially qualified for that guerilla warfare for which such a land was peculiarly suitable.

A Hercules or Samson is mightier to him than a Savonarola facing persecution with sublime tenacity of purpose and dying steadfast to his ideal, because he can understand the brute strength of the one, while the spiritual fortitude of the other is beyond his comprehension.

Ellis adhered with wonderful tenacity to the idea that a boy's clothes could never be made too large, and, therefore, when Charlie had a new suit, it always appeared as if it had been made for some portly gentleman, and sent home to Charlie by mistake.

When these became allied to the tenacity, the organizing and legal genius of the Romans, a firm center of civilized life was established, which has survived the shocks of two thousand years of growth and conflict and will survive the upheaval of the present.

Hatred, distrust, the injection of petty interests, the tenacity of diplomatic conservatism will all work against a wise forbearance and a far-seeing policy, and the errors of the Vienna Conference of 1815 and of the Berlin Conference of 1878 may be duplicated or worse.

In place of the old untrustworthy method he had banished, he endeavored to supply a new, of better qualities and greater tenacity; a system of methods by which it was possible to acquire new historical documents and also to improve the study of those already known.

Since any attention bestowed upon these animals is in no sense gainful or useful, it is also reputable; and since the habit of giving them attention is consequently not deprecated, it may grow into an habitual attachment of great tenacity and of a most benevolent character.

Nothing is so irresistible as a tyrannical power commanding in the name of the people, because, while it exercises that moral influence which belongs to the decisions of the majority, it acts at the same time with the promptitude and the tenacity of a single man.

I particularly admire the splendid tenacity displayed by our infantry in holding on to their trenches during so many long hours of heavy shell fire, and the skill with which they so gloriously repulsed with bomb and rifle the enemy's most determined onslaught.

News, however, there was of Herbert, which in some measure relieved their worst fears and gave room for hope; although sickening in its uncertainty, it gave room for hope, to which every member of both families clung with the tenacity naturally inspired by their affection.

The history of England seems to show with remarkable constancy that the national consciousness has been in its most effective action limited to those elementary conceptions which have been simple and broad enough to manifest themselves in a common purpose of great strength and tenacity.

He had partially succeeded, when the Indian, recovering consciousness, made a movement that threw his body over the precipice, down which he would have fallen had he not blindly caught at the freed arm of Holden, which he clutched with the tenacity of despair.

The impure air, the marked and rapid changes of temperature, and the foul water, rendered the tenacity of animal life a simple problem, and when joined to the deprivation of food, it became a matter of surprise that any of the hapless wretches escaped with life.

We next turn our attention to the adjacent barbican tower, whose massive walls are seamed from top to base by huge, gaping rents, through which the daylight peers; yet so great is their tenacity they still remain intact, and support the original stone roof.

Richardson informs us that its strength and agility, combined with its great tenacity of life, render an attack upon it very hazardous, and its pursuit has always been considered by the rude inhabitants of the northern regions as a matter of the highest importance.

By some inherited tenacity of constitution he had survived those years of starvation, cold, and brutality, and was, upon going to sea, like a well-seasoned rattan, without an ounce of superfluous flesh upon him, and with a capacity for stolid endurance almost equalling a Seminole Indian.

Many of them, trained in the severe experience of the great war, and in frequent campaigns on the Western plains, officers and men alike exhibited a great skill, fortitude, and tenacity, with results which have added a new chapter of glory to their country's history.

Inserted between his nether and outer shirts were two gilt "Directions to Travelers" which clung like mustard plasters to his back, while a jagged tin sign, wrenched from the home terminal, embraced his stomach with the painful tenacity of the historic Spartan fox.

Everywhere there is evidence of the final object in view, the unconquerable will, the inflexible resolve, the fixed purpose, the indomitable perseverance, the unyielding persistency, the infinite and interminable patience, the calm endurance, the irresistible courage, and the grim tenacity of the ego.

The sister city within sight, and almost within hearing, can show an unequaled roll of civic worthies, animated from the beginning by an unparalleled tenacity of purpose, clearly seeing and understanding what they wanted, and why, and how they could obtain their desire.

It is finely situated on the west bank of the Hudson; many of its inhabitants are descended from the first colonists, especially the adventurous and persevering Dutch, who, like the Scotch, cling with tenacity to the spot they fix upon, and quickly accumulate property.

To even the most absurd and superstitious of these, they cling with such tenacity, that it would be a work of incalculable labor, and of many years, to induce them to abandon them altogether, even after they should be made conscious of their absurdity and barbarity.

At the approach of a great danger, these tribes might consent to coalesce and to form alliances, or even confederations; but the federal tie, never one of much tenacity, and rarely capable of holding its ground in the presence of monarchic vigor, was here especially weak.

The Dervishes defended themselves with the greatest tenacity, sometimes rushing out and hurling themselves upon their assailants, and defending the houses to the last, making a stand when the doors were burst open, until the last of the inmates were either shot or bayoneted.

Despite her veil she was too striking looking not to fetter the attention of even the most listless, for the disgust with which these surroundings inspired her and the tenacity of her cruel design gave her a bearing such as Clytemnestra might have envied.

Though Comte's character and aims were as far removed as possible from Franklin's type, neither Franklin nor any man that ever lived could surpass him in the heroic tenacity with which, in the face of a thousand obstacles, he pursued his own ideal of a vocation.

In every well-constituted nature there must be a power of tenacity, a gift of perseverance of will; and that man might not be without a foundation for so needful a property, the Creator has laid it in an animal faculty, which he possesses in common with the brutes.

His merit varies according to the felicity with which he is able, in that region, to exercise his free choice and frame his individual ideal, and according to the tenacity with which he strives to grasp and realize his choice, or to attain perfection according to that ideal.

The nature, doubtless, is complex, and stern determination and tenacity are part of it; but there is also the other side, which is much forgotten - especially by that class of writers who have to describe human character as rigidly symmetrical and unnaturally harmonious.

"I know," he said, "no such unquestionable badge and ensign of a sovereign mind as that tenacity of purpose, which, through all change of companions or parties or fortunes, changes never, bates no jot of heart or hope, but wearies out opposition and arrives at its port."

And now, does not the account immediately connected with the text picture for us exactly the state of men whose conceptions have been broken up by a great shock, and yet in whose hearts the central hope still remains and vibrates with mysterious tenacity?

We can hardly solve the tenacity of purpose with which Handel persevered in the composition of operatic music after it had ruined him; but it was still some time before he fully appreciated the true turn of his genius, which could not be trifled with or ignored.

In the initial stages of planning, his fiery initiative and amazing grasp of detail commanded attention, speedily resulting in the first general plan of the sculpture of the buildings and grounds; while later his tenacity and generosity assured the completed unity, as it now stands.

Though he belonged to the Liberal party in politics he was essentially of conservative disposition, and often spoke with sarcastic boastfulness to his Liberal friends of the stupidity and tenacity of the English mind in adhering to old ways, as displayed in city and country alike.

Unless systematically persecuted, the fox, the otter, and the badger cling to their respective haunts with such tenacity that, season after season, they prowl along the same familiar paths through the woods or by the river, and rear their young in the same retreats.

Gwendolen's girlish type of egoism, which loves to be the center of admiration, here meets with that far other deadlier form of an "exorbitant egoism," conspicuous for its intense obstinacy and tenacity of rule, "in proportion as the varied susceptibilities of younger years are stripped away."

Beauregard, drawn by the firing at that point, and noticing the courage and tenacity with which the Northern troops held their ground, sending in volley after volley, divined at once that these were not the beaten troops of the day before, but new men.

Men in the trenches whose duty still lay before them, marveled at the strength and endurance, the proficiency and the tenacity of those other men, far behind the lines, who were feeding, feeding, feeding shells into the maw of this tremendous array of artillery.

If any man was ever born to be a pioneer in any kind of human endeavor requiring tenacity of purpose, scrupulous integrity, courage in the face of trial, tolerance of the shortcomings of others, and a dogged insistence upon "quality," that man was Major Pond, and he looked it.

It is true that his center was pierced by the Romans who were escaping the pressure of the two Carthaginian wings, that they were in disorder because they had fought and pushed back the Gauls, whom Hannibal knew how to make fight with singular tenacity.

His vanity demanded an assurance that her heart was as entirely his as he hoped, yet he knew that he loved her all the more tenderly, and reverently, because of the true womanly delicacy that prompted her to shroud her real feelings, with such desperate tenacity.

At the end of each voyage he visited home, deposited the money he had brought, and waited in the street just long enough for a sight of Minnie, sweet and matronly, and for a sight of the minister, who was holding on to life with a remarkable tenacity.

Had it been otherwise, such was the tenacity of my grasp on the one hand, and such his momentum on the other, that Grizzle must have left the natural ornament of his cerebrum, while I, though unjustly, must have been charged with imitating our heathenish Aborigines.

If they are of the sullen sort they will meet you coldly, or pass you by without seeing you; and will either drift into a permanent estrangement or come round after a time, according to the degree of acidity in their blood and the amount of tenacity in their character.

When the wild horse and the reindeer diminished in Europe, and a newer type of human culture, with a greater power over food supply, a greater tenacity of settlement, and probably a larger social organization, arose, the Reindeer Men had to learn fresh ways of living or disappear.

These insects, with which the bushes and even the ground seemed to be covered, fastened themselves with such tenacity upon our flesh, that when picking them off in the morning, the head would remain sticking fast to the skin, causing in most cases a painful wound.