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verb
Avert  v. i.  To turn away. (Archaic) "Cold and averting from our neighbor's good."






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Avert" Quotes from Famous Books



... appointed time, the predicted phenomenon took place, and the wild howls of the savages proclaimed their abject terror. They came in a body to Columbus, and implored his intercession. They promised to let him want for nothing if only he would avert this judgment: as all earnest of their sincerity they collected hastily a quantity of food, and offered it at his feet. At first, diplomatically hesitating, Columbus presently affected to be softened by ...
— The Life of Columbus • Arthur Helps

... possession of them, and drove them on up the further slope. Thus the troops behind saw their wagons dip down, reappear, and continue on their course. The idea of an ambush could not suggest itself. Only one thing could avert an absolute catastrophe, and that was the appearance of a hero who would accept certain death in order to warn his comrades. Such a man rode by the wagons—though, unhappily, in the stress and rush of the moment there is no certainty ...
— The Great Boer War • Arthur Conan Doyle

... by the name of Higgins. This was in the eleventh century, when our people were living in Aberdeen, county of Cork, England. Why it is that our long line has ever since borne the maternal name (except when one of them now and then took a playful refuge in an alias to avert foolishness), instead of Higgins, is a mystery which none of us has ever felt much desire to stir. It is a kind of vague, pretty romance, and we leave it alone. All the old families ...
— Quotations from the Works of Mark Twain • David Widger

... pure patriot and Stoic moralist Joseph Mazzini. To him she wrote twice—once apparently before leaving London, and again from Seaforth. His letters in reply, tenderly sympathetic and yet rigidly insistent on the duty of forbearance and endurance, availed to avert the threatened catastrophe; but there are sentences which show how bitter the complaints ...
— Thomas Carlyle - Biography • John Nichol

... ploughman was as great a hero as he who was called from his oxen to save Rome from her enemies—I should still say that, at such a crisis, you want the affections of all your subjects in both islands. There is no spirit which you must alienate, no heart you must avert. Every man must feel he has a country, and that there is an urgent and pressing cause why he should expose ...
— Sydney Smith • George W. E. Russell

... To avert this crisis some daring and original plan of communication had to be organized to keep the East and West in close contact with each other; and the Pony Express was the fulfillment of such a plan, for it made a close cooperation between the California loyalists and the Federal Government ...
— The Story of the Pony Express • Glenn D. Bradley

... contents of this despatch with any of his English ministers. The only person whom he consulted was Heinsius. Portland received a kind letter warmly approving all that he had said in the conference, and directing him to declare that the English government sincerely wished to avert the calamities which were but too likely to follow the death of the King of Spain, and would therefore be prepared to take into serious consideration any definite plan which His Most Christian Majesty might think fit to suggest. "I will own to you," William ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 5 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... seemed inexplicable, she related her dream to her mother, Ute, a dame of great wisdom, who interpreted it as foretelling for her a noble husband, "whom God protect, lest thou lose him too early." Kriemhild, in dread of the omen, desired to avert it by remaining unwed, a course from which her mother attempted to dissuade her, telling her that if ever she were destined to know heartfelt joy it would be from ...
— Hero Tales and Legends of the Rhine • Lewis Spence

... subject she dreaded. He took her hand in his, and led her into the shady drawing-room. She made no attempt to protest, nor did she offer him any formal greeting. She was oppressed and hypnotized by the conviction that a crisis was about to break over her head which no power of hers could avert. He did not let her hand go. He still held it between his own as they stood opposite each other, and she felt that he ...
— The Native Born - or, The Rajah's People • I. A. R. Wylie

... most developed dolls. A huge quarter of the place, the biggest bazaar "on earth," was peopled with these and other effigies and fantasies, as well as with purchasers and vendors, haggard alike in the blaze of the gas with hesitations. I was just about to appeal to Flora to avert that stage of my errand when I saw that she was accompanied by a gentleman whose identity,'though more than a year had elapsed, came back to me from the Folkestone cliff.' It had been associated in that scene with showy knickerbockers; at present it ...
— Embarrassments • Henry James

... he, and his voice trembled, "the danger that I can avert no more, if thou linger still in Naples, comes hourly near and near to thee! On the third day from this thy fate must be decided. I accept thy promise. Before the last hour of that day, come what may, I shall see thee again, HERE, ...
— Zanoni • Edward Bulwer Lytton

... the time his heart prompted him to open it. On the eighth day his curiosity got the better of him and he said, "Come what will, needs must I open the door and see what will happen to me therefrom. Nothing can avert what is fated and fore-ordained of Allah the Most High; nor doth aught befal but by His will." So saying, he rose and broke the padlocks and opening the door saw a narrow passage, which he followed for some three ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 6 • Richard F. Burton

... first place, it struck me as curious, before I came here, that you had sent off that check for five thousand pounds to Lord Stanway an hour or so after the robbery was discovered; it looked so much as though you were sure of the cameo never coming back, and were in a hurry to avert suspicion. Of course I understood that, so far as I then knew the case, you were the most unlikely person in the world, and that your eagerness to repay Lord Stanway might be the most creditable thing possible. But the point was worth remembering, ...
— Martin Hewitt, Investigator • Arthur Morrison

... years of Madame Recamier's life is inexpressibly touching, telling as it does of self-denial, patient suffering, and silent devotion. To avert the blindness which was gradually stealing upon her, she submitted to an operation, which might have been successful, had she obeyed the injunctions of her physicians. But Ballanche lay dying in the opposite house, and, true to the noble instincts of her heart, she could not let the friend ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 84, October, 1864 - A Magazine Of Literature, Art, And Politics • Various

... dictated, having expelled the British factory and the British minister, confiscated all English property, and shut the ports against all English vessels, became convinced at length that no measures of subserviency could avert the doom which Napoleon had fulminated. A Moniteur, proclaiming that "the House of Braganza had ceased to reign," reached Lisbon. The Prince Regent re-opened his communication with the English ...
— The History of Napoleon Buonaparte • John Gibson Lockhart

... the eyes of the happy man, but sadly solemn in the eyes of him in whose heart the dreary thoughts of the past are at a like game. Behind Donal lay a world of dreams into which he dared not turn and look, yet from which he could scarce avert ...
— Donal Grant • George MacDonald

... they would repent, perhaps The Lord would turn away His anger from the earth and thus Avert the ...
— The Flood • Anonymous

... dogmatically preclude Israel from continuing to suffer elsewhere, nor forbid Israel from pursuing her missionary project of acting as a model example and shining light to the nations. Quite the reverse; inasmuch as the Dispersion is fast becoming a Destruction, which Zionism is attempting to avert, the preservation of Reform Judaism itself demands the ...
— The Menorah Journal, Volume 1, 1915 • Various

... him. Bert—and, blast the fellow! he was, doubtless, dining then with a far preferable companion—his wife—in a palace-car on the P., C. & St. L., a hundred miles away. The thought was maddening. Of course, now, the landlady would have material for a new assault. And how could he avert it? A despairing film blurred his sight for the moment—then the eyes flashed daringly. "I will meet it like a man!" he said, mentally—"like a State's Attorney,—I will invite it! Let ...
— Pipes O'Pan at Zekesbury • James Whitcomb Riley

... forest, until Mime is in an agony of fear. But on this scene depends the whole subsequent action. Mime tries to frighten Siegfried, and finds it impossible. He wants the Nibelung's ring to rule the world: Siegfried is the only man to get it; and after he has got it, Mime will avert the Wanderer's prophesied disaster by poisoning him. He tells the history of Sieglinda also, and Siegfried knows he is the hero. He will have no patching of the sword: that sword was Wotan's and subject to his will; he grinds it to powder, ...
— Wagner • John F. Runciman

... thence to acting is often but a single step. But how irrevocable and tremendous! What a triumph to our enemies to verify their predictions!... Would to God that wise measures may be taken in time to avert the consequences we have but too ...
— Washington and the American Republic, Vol. 3. • Benson J. Lossing

... of giving away a "farm coupon" with every number may avert trouble for a time, but it will be only for a time. The reader will need a farm, on which to spread out and peruse his purchase; but the world is small, and land has not the self-inflating quality ...
— Modern Eloquence: Vol III, After-Dinner Speeches P-Z • Various

... read, Napoleon did not avert his eyes for a single moment from the countenance of the prince. He saw that he blushed with indignation at first, and that gradually a profound ...
— Napoleon and the Queen of Prussia • L. Muhlbach

... as if I could not lift my eyes to look at the man my mother-in-law indicated, and yet I knew I must glance casually at him if I were to avert the displeased suspicion which I already saw creeping into ...
— Revelations of a Wife - The Story of a Honeymoon • Adele Garrison

... satisfactory state. During this examination Sir Moses was in a state of great uneasiness, as the least indisposition would have subjected him and the rest of the party to an addition of forty days extra quarantine at the least, which he prayed heaven to avert, as he feared it would make us all seriously ill. The same evening Drs Keith and Black came to our tents and acquainted us with the news they had just received from Haifa. The road to Beyrout by the sea shore was infested with thieves, and ...
— Diaries of Sir Moses and Lady Montefiore, Volume I • Sir Moses Montefiore

... leaving him and his child vainly calling to each other across an ever-widening, impassable gulf. Already he foresaw as possible results all that he had most wished to avoid, and felt himself powerless to avert them; for, however ready to alienate her from good influences, and expose her to bad ones, he yet shrank from inculcating falsehood and wrong by precept. With a boy it would have been different, and he might have had ...
— My Little Lady • Eleanor Frances Poynter

... name also, Kandrabhaga, which means "streak of the moon." The Greeks, however, pronounced that [Greek: Sandarophagos], and this had the unlucky meaning of "the devourer of Alexander." Hesychius tells us that in order to avert the bad omen Alexander changed the name of that river into [Greek: Akesines], which would mean "the Healer;" but he does not tell, what the Veda tells us, that this name [Greek: Akesines] was a Greek adaptation of another name of the same river, namely ...
— India: What can it teach us? - A Course of Lectures Delivered before the University Of Cambridge • F. Max Mueller

... postponed the repeal of the navigation laws, did not avert various modifications in our maritime code, which were made in the ensuing year. The consequences were not so disadvantageous as those who objected to the experiment feared, whereas the abettors of repeal contend that free trade in ships and ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.III. - From George III. to Victoria • E. Farr and E. H. Nolan

... every light of which it is capable; but it has been all in vain. Shall we resort to entreaty and humble supplication? What terms shall we find which have not been already exhausted? Let us not deceive ourselves longer. We have done everything that could be done to avert the storm which is now coming on. We have petitioned, we have remonstrated, we have supplicated; we have prostrated ourselves before the Throne, and have implored its interposition to arrest the tyrannical hand of the Ministry and Parliament. Our petitions have been slighted; our remonstrances ...
— One Thousand Secrets of Wise and Rich Men Revealed • C. A. Bogardus

... hundred and fifteen hundred. He lacked two cards to make the highest point possible, but Henri, by their absence from his own hand, could measure the peril that menaced him. So, surveying the number of cards that remained in stock, he guarded carefully three aces of trumps which might help him to avert disaster. But, playing the only ace that would allow him to score again, Paul Landry announced coldly, laying on the table four queens of spades ...
— Zibeline, Complete • Phillipe de Massa

... black smoke curled up from between the hulls. The English were suffering terribly. Captain Manners himself was wounded, and realizing that he was doomed to defeat unless by some desperate effort he could avert it, he gave the signal to board. At the call the boarders gathered, naked to the waist, black with powder and spattered with blood, cutlas and pistol in hand. But the Americans were ready. Their marines ...
— Hero Tales From American History • Henry Cabot Lodge, and Theodore Roosevelt

... deep pause, when Louis again spoke, although in the same tone, it was with an altered spirit. "But God forbid," he said, "that aught less than necessity should make us, the Most Christian' King, give cause to the effusion of Christian blood, if anything short of dishonour may avert such a calamity. We tender our subjects' safety dearer than the ruffle which our own dignity may receive from the rude breath of a malapert ambassador, who hath perhaps exceeded the errand with which he was charged.—Admit the Envoy of Burgundy to ...
— Quentin Durward • Sir Walter Scott

... him before the dawn; and putting things together clearly in his private thoughts, he perhaps attributed a meaning too immoral and too categorical to the unguarded counsels of his master. He understood his duty, in short, to have three branches: to take what was brought, to pay the price, and to avert the eye from any ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 3 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... already passed through, but that which runs forward into all the depths of eternity. When I lay me down to sleep, I recommend myself to His care; when I awake, I give myself up to His direction. Amidst all the evils that threaten me, I will look up to Him for help, and question not but He will either avert them, or turn them to my advantage. Though I know neither the time nor the manner of the death I am to die, I am not at all solicitous about it; because I am sure that he knows them both, and that He will not fail to comfort and support me ...
— Essays and Tales • Joseph Addison

... See to admit this plainly. It seems to me, as I have been saying, that Catholicity is not only one of the notes of the Church, but, according to the divine purposes, one of its securities. I think it would be a very serious evil, which Divine Mercy avert! that the Church should be contracted in Europe within the range of particular nationalities. It is a great idea to introduce Latin civilization into America, and to improve the Catholics there by the energy of French devotedness; ...
— Apologia Pro Vita Sua • John Henry Cardinal Newman

... and colonies that followed the French-German War of 1870 developed into an armament race after 1899. From the Hague Peace Conference of 1899 to the outbreak of general war in 1914, desperate efforts were made to maintain the power-balance and avert a general war. The failure of these efforts proved the ineffectiveness of the ...
— Civilization and Beyond - Learning From History • Scott Nearing

... impatience Phyllis sprang to her feet. After a pause she went to a little satin-wood cabinet which she had turned into a bookshelf, and took out her Bible. She had never slept a night for years without reading a chapter; and in order to avert the possibility of her own feelings or fancies of the moment making any invidious distinction between the various component parts of a book which is profitable in every line, she had accustomed ...
— Phyllis of Philistia • Frank Frankfort Moore

... seen by all his men. He, too, must have felt a singular thrill at that moment. He must have known that his star was rising. He, more than any other, with his valor, penetrating mind and decision had saved the Northern army from complete destruction the first day at Shiloh. He had not been able to avert defeat, but he had prevented utter ruin. His division alone had held together in the face of the Southern attack until ...
— The Guns of Shiloh • Joseph A. Altsheler

... remote, the arches as of crypts, smaller apartments, odd corners which had guarded the casks five hundred years ago. Each of these could show you its little company safe harbored for the night; each had some face from which Master Timidity might well avert his eyes. But Alban went in amongst them as though he had been their friend. They knew his very footstep, the older ...
— Aladdin of London - or Lodestar • Sir Max Pemberton

... fell upon her face that great heart of his, that had ever been adamant to beauty, a very Gibraltar against the wiles of the other sex, went down in the chaos of a first and overwhelming passion. So hard hit was he by Miss Tattersby's beauty that his chief thought now was to avert rather than to direct suspicion towards her. After all, she might have come into possession of the jewel honestly, though how the daughter of a retired missionary, considering its intrinsic value, could manage such a thing, ...
— R. Holmes & Co. • John Kendrick Bangs

... with the British government, his desire for peace, and deprecation of angry discussions." The Ranee sent silk purses, fans, and such Tibetan paraphernalia, with an equally amicable message, that "she was most anxious to avert the consequences of whatever complaints had gone forth against Dr. Campbell, who might depend on her strenuous exertions to persuade the Rajah to do whatever he wished!" These friendly messages were probably evoked by the information ...
— Himalayan Journals (Complete) • J. D. Hooker

... not mean absolutely to deny that, during the years preceding war, it would still have been possible for Germany to avert it if she had eradicated from European public opinion all suspicion respecting her dream of world dominion, for far be it from me to assert that the Western Powers were eager for war. On the contrary, it is my firm conviction ...
— In the World War • Count Ottokar Czernin

... and keep my judgments and laws, I shall set the throne of thy reign upon Israel evermore, like as I have said to thy father David, saying: There shall not be taken away a man of thy generation from the reign and seat of Israel. If ye avert and turn from me, ye and your sons, not following ne keeping my commandments and ceremonies that I have showed tofore you, but go and worship strange gods, and honor them, I shall cast away Israel from the face of the earth that I have given to them, ...
— Bible Stories and Religious Classics • Philip P. Wells

... magistrates shut themselves up in dismay; the small body of Roman soldiery reserved their strength for the defence of themselves; and the poor wretches, not a few, who had fallen from the faith, and offered sacrifice, hung out from their doors sinful heathen symbols, to avert a storm against which apostasy was no sufficient safeguard. In this conduct the Gnostics and other sectaries imitated them, while the Tertullianists took a more manly part, ...
— Callista • John Henry Cardinal Newman

... his daughter Chione, who had been slain for vying with Diana, has been transformed into a hawk. During this relation, Peleus is informed that a wolf which Psamathe has sent to revenge the death of Phocus, is destroying his herds. He endeavours to avert the wrath of the Goddess, but she is deaf to his entreaties, till, by the intercession of Thetis, she is appeased, and she ...
— The Metamorphoses of Ovid - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Copious Notes - and Explanations • Publius Ovidius Naso

... pot, with which she immediately fumigated us by marching round several times, and so manipulating her pot as to produce the largest volume of smoke. This custom, which is so general throughout Cyprus, is supposed to avert the evil-eye; but I imagine that it originated during a period when the plague or some other fatal epidemic was prevalent in the island, and fumigation was supposed ...
— Cyprus, as I Saw it in 1879 • Sir Samuel W. Baker

... vigorous general health, who, on being lifted too suddenly to a sitting position, while still confined to her bed, fainted, and in a few moments ceased to breathe. It may well be supposed that he took every possible precaution to avert the accidents which tend to throw from its track a disease the regular course of which is arranged by nature as carefully as the route of a railroad from one city to another. The most natural interpretation which the common observer would put upon the manifestations ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... ground, but at that cave he stuck most finally. All around the lime and stone had lapsed into debris, and he could find no safe foothold. Worse still, the block on which he relied proved loose, and only by a dangerous traverse did he avert disaster. ...
— Huntingtower • John Buchan

... To avert this threatened danger; to contrive taxation that should so far please the taxed that they would refrain from using the power in their hands to escape altogether any taxation for general purposes,—was the ...
— James Madison • Sydney Howard Gay

... the public report, approve of the financial schemes out of which your Ministers make their fortunes, to the utter ruin of the people in general," she said slowly; "Dismiss Carl Perousse from office! So may you perchance avert a great national disaster!" ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli

... in my distress, and that He has always granted my prayers. Despair brings death, but prayer does away with despair; and when a man has prayed he feels himself supported by new confidence and endowed with power to act. As to the means employed by the Sovereign Master of human beings to avert impending dangers from those who beseech His assistance, I confess that the knowledge of them is above the intelligence of man, who can but wonder and adore. Our ignorance becomes our only resource, and happy, truly happy; ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... himself, he sighed at the wickedness and ingratitude of the agricultural classes of Oude; and the baneful effects of this sad sigh has been upon us ever since, sir, in spite of all we can do to avert them. In order to have the blessing of God upon our labours, it is necessary for us to fulfil strictly all the responsibilities under which we hold and till the land; first, to pay punctually the just ...
— A Journey through the Kingdom of Oude, Volumes I & II • William Sleeman

... in about entire. Fouquet had the first division of them, and a secondary charge of the whole; an extremely strict, almost pedantic man, and of very fiery temper: "HE, D'OU VENEZ-VOUS?" asked he sharply of Retzow senior, who had broken through his order, one day, to avert great mischief: "How come you here, MON GENERAL?" "By the Highway, your Excellency!" answered Retzow in a grave stiff tone. ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVIII. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—Seven-Years War Rises to a Height.—1757-1759. • Thomas Carlyle

... unsurmountable obstacle. Except for Mother Moll, he was alone in the house with Tess and the Waldstricker child. Here was a terrible predicament. He'd already lost many years of his life, because he was present when Waldstricker's father was killed. He'd done what he could to avert that crime and paid a heavy penalty, for his interference. What to do, now, he didn't know. How to save the little one and protect Tess he couldn't guess. Casting frightened eyes first on the girl, then on the silent child, he crouched against ...
— The Secret of the Storm Country • Grace Miller White

... forenoon, and a hand-to-hand fight had lasted till the evening, when two thousand of the enemy and five hundred of the scanty garrison had fallen, the Knights and their soldiers prepared for the end. They knew the Grand Master could not save them, that nothing could avert the inevitable dawn. They took the Sacrament from each other's hands, and "committing their souls to God made ready to devote their bodies in the cause of His Blessed Son." It was a forlorn and sickly remnant of the proudest chivalry the world has ever ...
— The Story of the Barbary Corsairs • Stanley Lane-Poole

... experience fear, and are thereby excited to exertions for averting it. If we succeed in doing so, we experience joy; if not, we feel sorrow. If the evil seem unavoidable, we again give way to despair, and are thus led to relinquish all attempts to avert it.—Similar emotions attend on the affections. When we experience an affection, we desire to be able to act upon it. When we see a prospect of doing so, we hope; if there seem to be none, we despair of accomplishing our object. When we have acted upon a benevolent affection, or according ...
— The Philosophy of the Moral Feelings • John Abercrombie

... been taken, the prize so tempting to his ambition having been snatched, and the policy which had governed the united action of the States and himself seeming so sound, what ought he to have done in order to avert the tempest which he must have foreseen? Surely a man who knew so much of woman's nature and of Elizabeth's nature as he did, ought to have attempted to conciliate her affections, after having so deeply wounded her pride. He knew his power. Besides the graces of his person and manner—which ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... reached him the Duke's courage suddenly gave way. His retreat to Cambridge was the signal for a general defection. Northumberland himself threw his cap into the air and shouted with his men for Queen Mary. But his submission failed to avert his doom; and the death of the Duke drew with it the imprisonment in the Tower of the hapless girl whom he had made the tool ...
— History of the English People - Volume 4 (of 8) • John Richard Green

... he sat on the opposite side of the fire glaring at his host, that Bladud became impressed with a hope that the maniac— for such he evidently was—would not attempt to prove his resistless power there and then. In order to avert such a catastrophe, he assumed an air of the most perfect ease and indifference to the boast, and asked him with a bland smile if he would ...
— The Hot Swamp • R.M. Ballantyne

... growing popularity of Jesus, evidenced by the fact that even more followed after Him and accepted baptism at the hands of His disciples than had responded to the Baptist's call. Open opposition was threatened; and as Jesus desired to avert the hindrance to His work which such persecution at that time would entail, He withdrew from Judea and retired to Galilee, journeying by way of Samaria. This return to the northern province was effected after the Baptist had been ...
— Jesus the Christ - A Study of the Messiah and His Mission According to Holy - Scriptures Both Ancient and Modern • James Edward Talmage

... over the astonishing record of George Warrington Steevens's thirty years, we are divided between the balance of loss and gain. The loss to his own intimates must be intolerable. From that, indeed, we somewhat hastily avert our eyes. Remains the loss to the great reading public, which we believe that Steevens must have done a vast deal to educate, not to literature so much as to a pride in our country's imperial destiny. Where the elect chiefly admired a scarcely ...
— From Capetown to Ladysmith - An Unfinished Record of the South African War • G. W. Steevens

... accepting a constitutional system of government and the national Italian policy of Victor Emmanuel. But neither the summons from Turin, nor the agitation of the Muratists, nor the warnings of Great Britain that the Bourbon dynasty could only avert its fall by reform, produced any real change in the spirit of the Neapolitan Court. Ministers were removed, but the absolutist and anti-national system remained the same. Meanwhile Garibaldi was gathering his followers round him in Genoa. On ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe

... that to publish such a book without a full intention of putting its principles into practice is a mere parade of insincerity and foolishness. And so—from your point of view—she will be saving the monarchy from a danger which no one else can avert; for I am not prepared to surrender my power to do mischief into any hands but hers. A copy of the book, you may be interested to hear, has already gone to her; and her silence about it warns me that the epoch it so strenuously ...
— King John of Jingalo - The Story of a Monarch in Difficulties • Laurence Housman

... for a moment, or rather is rightly judged of while I look at nothing but thy colouring; but when I withdraw my eye from that, and the scene rises before me in the hues it is accustomed to derive from my own fancy, my soul droops, and I pray Heaven to avert such a destiny. ...
— Jane Talbot • Charles Brockden Brown

... car, the whistle blew its mockery of me; and the slow movement which immediately followed was the snapping of the thread, - the parting of the lines. It was something that no human action could stay or avert now; and the gentle motion soon grew to a whirl of speed which bore me relentlessly away. The slow pang of that first stir of the cars, ...
— Daisy in the Field • Elizabeth Wetherell

... so sure that we have arrived in time to avert a tragedy," said Jack, and he told of the ...
— The Ocean Wireless Boys And The Naval Code • John Henry Goldfrap, AKA Captain Wilbur Lawton

... diplomacy and the jealousies of foreign powers unite to make possible the averting of war during long periods of time. Diplomacy averted war with Germany for forty-three years, but it could not continue to avert war eternally. War finally broke out with a violence unparalleled in history, and possessing a magnitude proportional to the duration of the preceding peace. "Long coming long last, short notice soon past" ...
— The Navy as a Fighting Machine • Bradley A. Fiske

... may call itself. Ruling classes have always said that masses were incapable of understanding foreign policy. The masses understand it now. They understand that in spite of very earnest efforts in various Cabinets, the ruling classes have failed to avert the most terrible disaster in history. The masses will say to themselves, 'At any rate we couldn't have done worse than that.' The masses know that if the war decision had been openly submitted to a representative ...
— The Healing of Nations and the Hidden Sources of Their Strife • Edward Carpenter

... humble, and the older he grew the humbler he became. He felt more and more his own utter insufficiency. It grieved him that human eyes should ever turn away from the Master to the servant, and he perpetually sought to avert their gaze from himself to God alone. "For of Him, and through Him, and to Him are all things—to Whom be glory ...
— George Muller of Bristol - His Witness to a Prayer-Hearing God • Arthur T. Pierson

... command the entire prohibition also of the trade of the said Nueva Espana with the said Philipinas Islands: Having discussed and considered this in my royal Council of the Indias, and consultations being held on all that should be considered in this matter, as it appears that they desire to prevent and avert future losses, and likewise aim to secure the preservation and growth of the Christian religion in the said islands, and the neighboring kingdoms, wherein the service of our Lord is so greatly concerned, I have decided that for the present the trade and ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898, - Volume XIII., 1604-1605 • Ed. by Blair and Robertson

... "Illusions Perdues," and "Cesar Birotteau" he gives different phases of this life, spent partly in the printer's office and partly in the streets, rushing anxiously from place to place and from person to person, trying vainly by interviews to avert ...
— Honore de Balzac, His Life and Writings • Mary F. Sandars

... to which he desires your answer. There is nothing else that is new to relate, unless that we all desire greatly to return to the city. The day of our return is not yet fixed, but soon will be, unless the pestilence should increase and occasion greater alarm, which may God avert! ...
— Amerigo Vespucci • Frederick A. Ober

... can this be? What power does she suppose is in the person she petitions to avert this unjust suspicion, if it be unjust? Her Lady's handsome eyes regard her with astonishment, ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens

... Richard sank down on a sofa and covered his face with his hands. It burned them, but he sat motionless, repeating to himself, mechanically, as if to avert thought, "You fool! you fool!" At last he got up and made ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 117, July, 1867. • Various

... year 2027, the government will somehow have to come up with an extra $200 billion to keep the system afloat — and by 2033, the annual shortfall would be more than $300 billion. By the year 2042, the entire system would be exhausted and bankrupt. If steps are not taken to avert that outcome, the only solutions would be dramatically higher taxes, massive new borrowing, or sudden and severe cuts in Social Security benefits or other ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... what I know. In our temple we have begun prayers the second time to avert misfortune from Phoenicia. We had our first prayers before Thou ...
— The Pharaoh and the Priest - An Historical Novel of Ancient Egypt • Boleslaw Prus

... the time cannot be far distant when some statesman of the type of Gladstone will try to avert the danger threatening the British empire through an ever-discontented Ireland, by conceding to her at least the amount of self-government possessed by Canada ...
— The Life Story of an Old Rebel • John Denvir

... would in that event dissolve, and a large majority of the voters belonging to that party would fall into their ranks. If the whig party should hang together, and God grant they may, if for no other reason, to avert a calamity so awful, then are they again destined to meet with defeat and discomfiture, as heretofore. It is true that the whig party may not have entire confidence in their rivals, the democratic party; they may doubt the propriety of some of the measures advocated by them—the purity ...
— A Review of Uncle Tom's Cabin - or, An Essay on Slavery • A. Woodward

... late beheld, in mingled train, Twelve mortals ape twelve deities in vain; Caesar assumed what was Apollo's due, And wine and lust inflamed the motley crew. At the foul sight the gods avert their eyes, And from his throne great ...
— The Lives Of The Twelve Caesars, Complete - To Which Are Added, His Lives Of The Grammarians, Rhetoricians, And Poets • C. Suetonius Tranquillus

... only made a vow within herself that she would do what she could to avert from the girl she loved such ...
— The Guinea Stamp - A Tale of Modern Glasgow • Annie S. Swan

... during the progress of the war—over the fitting out of Confederate cruisers at English ports to prey upon the commerce of the United States, over captured mails, etc.—in which all of Lincoln's sagacity and patience were needed to avert an open rupture with the British government. That the strain was severe and the danger great is made clear by an entry in Mr. Welles's Diary, in which he says: "We are in no condition for a foreign war. Torn by dissensions, an exhausting civil war on our hands, we have ...
— The Every-day Life of Abraham Lincoln • Francis Fisher Browne

... if useless for aught else, he will do for a bugbear to keep his children quiet. When they arrive home the little ones begin to cry. "Was I not right?" quoth Esop, and the other slaves think he has been bought to avert ...
— Flowers from a Persian Garden and Other Papers • W. A. Clouston

... on the intellectual side; but how can we describe the moral transformation which the new faith brought to pass? Men who had hitherto only regarded gods as beings to be entreated to avert ill or bestow blessing, now learnt the nobler emotion of devout love for a divinity of supreme power and beneficence. The new faith, besides kindling love for God, inflamed the kindred sentiment of love for men, all of whom it ...
— Critical Miscellanies (Vol. 2 of 3) - Turgot • John Morley

... no Language, but a Character which the Lovers invented to avert Discovery: Ha, I hear my old Master coming down Stairs, it is impossible you shou'd have an Answer; away, and bid him come himself for that—begone we are ruined if you're seen, for he has doubl'd his ...
— The Busie Body • Susanna Centlivre

... who, as the friend and landlord of the prince, was also much agitated. Vera Lebedeff told all she knew, and by Lebedeff's advice it was decided that all three should go to Petersburg as quickly as possible, in order to avert "what might so ...
— The Idiot • (AKA Feodor Dostoevsky) Fyodor Dostoyevsky

... complacency, and even mirth that he discovered in that house of death. The Queen herself, however, overwrought by the events, and perhaps conscience-stricken by the tragedy which in the eleventh hour she had sought to avert, burst into tears at sight of Sully, and brought in the Dauphin, who flung himself upon the ...
— The Historical Nights Entertainment, Second Series • Rafael Sabatini

... were fairly free from faults. Many of them served as schools, hospitals, and inns, and all distributed alms to the poor who knocked at their gates. But the undoubted usefulness and irreproachable character of the larger foundations did not avail to avert the indiscriminate ruin of all. A bill was passed which at once dissolved between three and four hundred of the smaller monasteries, and gave all their property to ...
— A General History for Colleges and High Schools • P. V. N. Myers

... the germ of the forcible explosion. German policy was obliged to try to avert the danger of war by an understanding with the individual powers of the Entente. At the same time she was obliged to strengthen her defensive forces so that she should be prepared if war should come all the same. We did both. In France we always encountered ideas of revanche felt by ambitious politicians. ...
— The New York Times Current History: the European War, February, 1915 • Various

... silence of the night, however, Mrs. Butler arose, resolved, if possible, to avert, at least to delay, the fate which hung over her nephew, especially if, upon conversing with him, she should see any hope of his being brought to better temper. She had a master-key that opened every ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... would not look up. Some time after I learned how the accident occurred. The man who was killed belonged to an association which, among other mystic functions, claimed the exclusive power and privilege of fighting the thunder. Whenever a storm which they wished to avert was threatening, the thunder-fighters would take their bows and arrows, their guns, their magic drum, and a sort of whistle, made out of the wingbone of the war eagle. Thus equipped, they would run out and fire at the rising cloud, whooping, yelling, ...
— The Oregon Trail • Francis Parkman, Jr.

... Bennett's defeat! The very contingency he had fought so desperately to avert and for which he had sacrificed Ferriss—Lloyd's care of so perilous a disease—behold! the mysterious turn of the wheel had brought it about, and now ...
— A Man's Woman • Frank Norris

... Richelieu lived he might not have been able to avert such disasters. He and the queen have never been friends, and he would not have had the support from her that he has had from the king, who, although he no doubt fretted at times under Richelieu's dictation, yet recognized his splendid genius, and knew that he worked heart and soul for ...
— Won by the Sword - A Story of the Thirty Years' War • G.A. Henty

... his pensive face and gorgeous robes. San Donato, deposed from his lofty estate in the palace of a Russian prince, should preside as guardian spirit of her home. The image was invested with the gifts of the good fairy as much as he embodied any religious symbol. His mission was to avert evil. The saint passed to a new shrine without attendant priests, acolytes, and banners, the swinging of censers, the tinkling of bells, as in the fine old days before Rome was a modern European capital. It was not ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 7 • Various

... by the tails, anyhow," laughed Thugut, "for have not we got the list of the names here? Ah, my dear little count, perhaps you thought I would have gone in my generosity so far as to tear this list, throw the pieces away, and avert my head, like the pious bishop who found a murderer under his bed, permitted him to escape, and averted his head in order not to see the fugitive's face and may be recognize him on some future occasion? I like to know the faces of my enemies, and to find out their names, and, ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach

... midnight. Mr. Cobden having spoken on the part of the confederation, the closing of the debate was felt to be inevitable. Even then, by inducing a Protectionist to solicit the Speaker's eye, Lord George attempted to avert the division; but no supporter of the government measure, of any colour, advancing to reply to this volunteer, Bentinck was obliged to rise. He came out like a lion forced from his lair. And so it happened, that after all ...
— Lord George Bentinck - A Political Biography • Benjamin Disraeli

... more about it," Sommers answered, closing his lips firmly. "It is part of the mire; we must avert our eyes, Alves." ...
— The Web of Life • Robert Herrick

... within these three-and-thirty years, milk was put every Saturday for Greogach, or 'the Old Man with the Long Beard.' Whether Greogach was courted as kind, or dreaded as terrible, whether they meant, by giving him the milk, to obtain good, or avert evil, I was not informed. The Minister is now living by ...
— A Journey to the Western Isles of Scotland • Samuel Johnson

... half feet inside the tents, so that each dog hut was nearly twenty feet high. The diameter of a dog hut on the ground was sixteen feet. We made these huts spacious so that they might be as airy as possible, and thus avert the frost which is so injurious to dogs. Our purpose was entirely attained, for even in the severest weather no dogs were frozen. The tents were always warm and comfortable. Twelve dogs were housed in each, and every man had to take care of ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 21 - The Recent Days (1910-1914) • Charles F. Horne, Editor

... Mountains of Otz, past the ramparts of the impregnable fortresses of the Holy Therns, and upon your way Death in its most frightful form will overtake you—a death so horrible that even the Holy Therns themselves, who conceived both Life and Death, avert their eyes from its fiendishness and close their ears against the hideous shrieks ...
— The Gods of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... Ralph; "that would only increase the suspicion already attaching to her. No; she must face the danger, and I hope will be able to avert it." ...
— The Lancashire Witches - A Romance of Pendle Forest • William Harrison Ainsworth

... corresponding to this four years ago, all thoughts were anxiously directed to an impending civil war. All dreaded it—all sought to avert it. While the inaugural address was being delivered from this place, devoted altogether to saving the Union without war, insurgent agents were in the city seeking to destroy it without war—seeking to dissolve the Union, and divide effects, by negotiation. Both parties deprecated ...
— Lincoln's Inaugurals, Addresses and Letters (Selections) • Abraham Lincoln

... Fates they cannot avert in some figure occult, He foresaw in a moment each evil result Of the quarrel now imminent. There, face to face, 'Mid the ruins and tombs of a long-perish'd race, With, for witness, the stern Autumn Sky ...
— Lucile • Owen Meredith

... The statesmen of France, of England, and of Germany studied in the cool, grave school of her Senate. We need only turn to 'Othello' to find reflected the universal reverence for the wisdom of her policy and the order of her streets. No policy, however wise, could indeed avert her fall. The Turkish occupation of Egypt and the Portuguese discovery of a sea route round the Cape of Good Hope were destined to rob the Republic of that trade with the East which was the life-blood ...
— Stray Studies from England and Italy • John Richard Green

... the Squire, "I have already in your presence told Mr. Cossey under what circumstances I was favourably inclined to his proposal, so I need not repeat all that. As regards your means, although they would have been quite insufficient to avert the ruin which threatened us, still you have, I believe, a competence, and owing to your wonderful and most providential discovery the fear of ruin seems to have passed away. It is owing to you that this ...
— Colonel Quaritch, V.C. - A Tale of Country Life • H. Rider Haggard

... Southern agitators had resorted to secession and brought on civil war in 1850 the efforts of Mr. Webster to avert the calamity would have received unstinted praise from all classes in the North. If no secession had been attempted and no civil war had followed in 1861, and the South remaining in the Union had resumed the old course for the rights of Slavery in the Territories, Mr. Seward, Mr. Grow ...
— Twenty Years of Congress, Volume 2 (of 2) • James Gillespie Blaine

... of fever, and unexpectedly hurried, not to his trial, but to a sentence of death. The story is well known.—Yet pleading with "a voice grown weak by sickness and an ague he had at that instant on him," he used every means to avert his fate: he did, therefore, value the life he could so easily part with. His judges, there, at least, respected their state criminal, and they addressed him in a tone far different from that which he had fifteen years before listened ...
— Curiosities of Literature, Vol. 3 (of 3) • Isaac D'Israeli

... he held as guardian in pork margins, and a caprice of the powers that play with pork in Chicago had wiped him out. Judge Walters had just been asking impertinent questions about the guardianship money, and when he had gone to the First National Bank for a loan to tide over the judicial inquiry and avert an appeal to his bondsmen, William Holton had "called" a loan of three hundred dollars that the bank had been carrying for two years. This was very annoying, and it made the lawyer more tolerant of Jack Holton than ...
— Otherwise Phyllis • Meredith Nicholson

... of this new life welled up in him, as a spring of water overflows its bounds. A voice kept ringing in his ears, "I will pray for you." Subconsciously his mind kept saying, "Rosalie—Rosalie— Rosalie!" There was nothing now that he would not do to avert his being taken away upon this ridiculous charge. Mistaken identity? To prove that, he must at once prove himself—who he was, whence he came. Tell the Cure, and make it a point of honour for his ...
— The Judgment House • Gilbert Parker

... the precious lesson that prayer for others is a real power, and does bring down blessings and avert evils. Abraham did not here pray for Lot, but yet 'God remembered Abraham, and sent Lot out of the midst of the overthrow'(chap. xix. 29), so that there had been unrecorded intercession for him too. The unselfish ...
— Expositions of Holy Scripture - Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus and Numbers • Alexander Maclaren

... attempt to avert the unhappy doom pronounced by the old fairy, at once published an edict forbidding all persons, under pain of death, to use a spinning-wheel or keep a spindle ...
— Old-Time Stories • Charles Perrault

... rivals, Wordsworth had no feverish blood; nothing drove him to the world without; consequently his "eyes avert their ken from half of human fate," and his influence, though perennial, will always be limited. He conquered England from his hills and lakes; but his spirit has never crossed the Straits which he thought too narrow. The other, with a fever in his veins, calmed it in the sea and in the cloud, ...
— Byron • John Nichol

... Their full-fed heroes, their pacific mayors, Their annual trophies, and their monthly wars; Though long my party[372] built on me their hopes, For writing pamphlets, and for roasting popes; Yet lo! in me what authors have to brag on! Reduced at last to hiss in my own dragon. Avert it, Heaven! that thou, my Cibber, e'er Should'st wag a serpent-tail in Smithfield fair! Like the vile straw that's blown about the streets, The needy poet sticks to all he meets, 290 Coach'd, carted, trod upon, now loose, now fast, And carried off in some dog's tail at last; Happier thy fortunes! ...
— Poetical Works of Pope, Vol. II • Alexander Pope

... queen trembled, and she took from her head the ribbon with which she happened, in woman's fashion, to be adorning her hair, and proffered it to the enraged old man, as though she could avert his anger with a gift. Starkad in anger flung it back most ignominiously in the face of the giver, and began again in ...
— The Danish History, Books I-IX • Saxo Grammaticus ("Saxo the Learned")

... music, and with dances; but lascivious postures were banished from it. In the Tuscan language, says Livy, the word hister signifies a player; and therefore those actors which were first brought from Etruria to Rome on occasion of a pestilence, when the Romans were admonished to avert the anger of the gods by plays (in the year ab urbe condita CCCXC.)—those actors, I say, were therefore called histriones: and that name has since remained, not only to actors Roman born, but to all others of every nation. ...
— Discourses on Satire and Epic Poetry • John Dryden

... upon men thus exposed, without hope of escape or chance of resistance, that the first wrath of a general Indian war would break. No note of recall would avert their doom. Long before friendly runners could reach them, the war-whoop would be in their ears; and alone, unfriended, undefended, unaided, they would perish, as hundreds and thousands of our countrymen have perished, at the hands of the infuriated savages. But it is not alone the ...
— The Indian Question (1874) • Francis A. Walker

... matters of personal or selfish concern, as success in hunting or warfare, relief from sickness, or the sparing of a beloved life, were definitely relegated to the plane of the lower or material mind, and all ceremonies, charms, or incantations designed to secure a benefit or to avert a danger, were recognized as emanating from the ...
— The Soul of the Indian - An Interpretation • [AKA Ohiyesa], Charles A. Eastman

... sort of moodiness was nothing very strange to her. She knew that things that seemed to her utterly trivial, the reading of political speeches in The Times, little comments on life made in the most casual way, mere movements, could so avert him. She had cultivated a certain disregard of such fitful darknesses. But at the dinner-table she looked up, and was stabbed to the heart to see a haggard white face and eyes of ...
— Mr. Britling Sees It Through • H. G. Wells

... that they need no longer fear the woods, although they never ventured near the river or the falls without a heartache and the fervent wish that they might have reached the poor demented man with the glad news of his sons' safety in time to avert ...
— The Outdoor Girls at Wild Rose Lodge - or, The Hermit of Moonlight Falls • Laura Lee Hope

... secret treasure was got at by torture. That month of May 1527, with its awful experience, was an end to the pride and the hope and the gladness of the pagan revival; a severe and penitential spirit came over society, preparing to meet the Reformation by reform, and to avert change in doctrine by a change in morality. The sack of Rome, said Cardinal Cajetan, was a just judgment on the sufferers. The city was now the Emperor's, by right of conquest, to bestow as he chose, and the Romans were not unwilling that it should ...
— Lectures on Modern history • Baron John Emerich Edward Dalberg Acton

... were not allowed to communicate with the people until they all, or a few as representatives of the rest, had been taken to each of the four temples in the island, and prayers offered that the god would avert any disease or treachery which these strangers might have brought with them. Meat offerings were also laid upon the altars, accompanied by songs and dances in honour of the god. While these ceremonies were ...
— The Golden Bough - A study of magic and religion • Sir James George Frazer

... of a flushed and charming maiden in distress. She had lifted a great cut glass dish filled with strawberries, and it was more than her little hands could hold. She strove to avert a crash; and, just in time, the gallant young General caught the appealing look from the dark eyes and the toppling dish from the trembling hands. But in saving the bowl and the berries, he ...
— Virginia: The Old Dominion • Frank W. Hutchins and Cortelle Hutchins

... of liberty; and it is here—it is here, in this exalted refuge—here, if anywhere, will resistance be made to the storms of political phrensy and the silent arts of corruption; and if the Constitution be destined ever to perish by the sacrilegious hands of the demagogue or the usurper, which God avert, its expiring agonies will be ...
— Memoirs of Aaron Burr, Complete • Matthew L. Davis

... this dream to the soothsayers, and asked them what it meant. They said it must mean that her son would be the means of bringing some terrible calamities and disasters upon the family. The mother was terrified, and, to avert these calamities, gave the child to a slave as soon as it was born, and ordered him to destroy it. The slave pitied the helpless babe, and, not liking to destroy it with his own hand, carried it to Mount Ida, and left it there in the forests ...
— Alexander the Great - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... door of the library opened and my old master came in, reaching out his hands and saying, 'My dear boy, forgive me'—between heat and emotion he was nearly speechless—'forgive me, that man had a hold over me. I had to do it, I had to do it. I thought I could avert the disaster which threatens me, but destiny is not to be escaped, no, not even by a base act—' He held out his arms and I embraced him without the least anger, without indeed quite understanding the mystery of this ...
— The Immortal - Or, One Of The "Forty." (L'immortel) - 1877 • Alphonse Daudet

... No one appeared to be taking the slightest notice of one of many flirtations. At least, whatever his wife's infatuation, he could avert gossip. Mrs. Thornton might be a tigress, but she was not ...
— The Avalanche • Gertrude Franklin Horn Atherton

... that be of her nearest kin, Now o'er the threshold force her in. But to avert the worst Let her her fillets first Knit to the posts, this point Remembering, to anoint The sides, for 'tis a charm Strong against future harm; And the evil deads, the which There was ...
— The Hesperides & Noble Numbers: Vol. 1 and 2 • Robert Herrick

... done to the satisfaction of the company:—"Ofttimes," quoth she, "have we heard how with bright sallies, and ready retorts, and sudden devices, not a few have known how to repugn with apt checks the bites of others, or to avert imminent perils; and because 'tis an excellent argument, and may be profitable, I ordain that to-morrow, God helping us, the following be the rule of our discourse; to wit, that it be of such as by some sprightly ...
— The Decameron, Vol. II. • Giovanni Boccaccio

... public life. In you all parties confide; in you all interests unite; and we have no doubt that your past services, great as they have been, will be equaled by your future exertions, and that your prudence and sagacity as a statesman will tend to avert the dangers to which we were exposed, to give stability to the present Government and dignity and splendor to that country which your skill and valor as a soldier so eminently contributed to raise to independence ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 1 (of 4) of Volume 1: George Washington • James D. Richardson

... but look back with deep gratitude for the strange manner in which I have been enabled to avert all suspicion, and even to make myself quite a popular character among ...
— With Kitchener in the Soudan - A Story of Atbara and Omdurman • G. A. Henty

... himself at a window that commanded the entire spectacle. But it was no coward's death that he beheld. Soon perceiving and recognizing the monarch before whom he had witnessed so good a profession, the tailor fixed his gaze upon him, nor would he avert his face, however much the king ordered that his position should be changed. Even in the midst of the flames he still continued to direct his dying glance toward the king, until the latter, abashed, was compelled to withdraw from the window. For days Henry declared ...
— The Rise of the Hugenots, Vol. 1 (of 2) • Henry Martyn Baird

... the Palmer, "is prisoner, I should rather say slave, to the great Soldan, taken in a battle in which he did his duty, though unable to avert the defeat of the Christians, with which it was concluded. He was made prisoner while covering the retreat, but not until he had slain with his own hand, for his misfortune as it has proved, Hassan Ali, a favourite of the Soldan. The cruel ...
— The Betrothed • Sir Walter Scott

... distinguished from the ordinary image of God by caste and culture; and to these he added a fatal self-consciousness. Don't take me as saying that caste and culture could possibly have made him a boor; take me as saying that these had been powerless to avert the misfortune. He was a gentleman by the grace of God and the flunkeyism of man. Montgomery was also a gentleman, but only by virtue of his position. So that, for instance, Priestley's personal fac-simile, appearing as a well-to-do squatter, ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy

... tidings of the fatal consequences of his mandates, he had posted in all haste to Cuzco, where he was greeted with undisguised joy by the natives, as well as by the more temperate Spaniards, anxious to avert the impending storm. The governor's first interview was with Almagro, whom he embraced with a seeming cordiality in his manner; and, without any show of resentment, inquired into the cause of the present disturbances. To this the marshal replied, by throwing the blame on Pizarro's brothers; but, ...
— The History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William H. Prescott

... An awful sense of contrition seized Christians everywhere; they resolved to forsake their vices, to make restitution for past offences, before they were summoned hence, to seek reconciliation with their Maker, and to avert, by self-chastisement, the punishment due ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... with him, and upset his own tub, and was obliged to swim for the bank, but Billy managed to avert disaster, and went on ...
— The Hilltop Boys on the River • Cyril Burleigh

... it was because of the overwhelming dust: it was just sheer nervous anxiety to get back to the hotel for the latest news. We are all restless and anxious, and withal feel ourselves so utterly impotent to avert this impending calamity. Therefore, as I say, we didn't stay long at the fair,—just long enough for me to buy a pair of little, ancient, dilapidated stone lions, which the man assured me were of the Ming dynasty. My first venture into Ming. They looked it, anyway, when I bought ...
— Peking Dust • Ellen N. La Motte

... oratory, and sprang from an old Roman root, the tendency to defamation and satire, which may itself be attributed in part to the Italian custom of levelling abuse at a public man (e.g. at his triumph) in order to avert evil from him.[159] To single out a man's personal ugliness, to calumniate his ancestry in the vilest terms,—these were little more than traditional practices, oratorical devices, which the rhetorical education of the day encouraged, and which no one ...
— Social life at Rome in the Age of Cicero • W. Warde Fowler



Words linked to "Avert" :   avertible, head off, foreclose, aversion, prevent, debar, obviate, fend off, ward off, forbid, forefend, turn, avoid, deflect, turn away, forfend, preclude



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