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Detach   Listen
verb
Detach  v. t.  (past & past part. detached; pres. part. detaching)  
1.
To part; to separate or disunite; to disengage; the opposite of attach; as, to detach the coats of a bulbous root from each other; to detach a man from a leader or from a party.
2.
To separate for a special object or use; used especially in military language; as, to detach a ship from a fleet, or a company from a regiment.
Synonyms: To separate; disunite; disengage; sever; disjoin; withdraw; draw off. See Detail.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Detach" Quotes from Famous Books



... hesitated; it was only the father of the little boy who had died who admitted in low tones: "You would have said—At least even I could imagine that Gargoyle—well—that he saw something like a released principle of life fly happily back to its main source—as if a little mote like a sunbeam should detach itself from a clod and, disembodied, dart back to its ...
— The Best Short Stories of 1920 - and the Yearbook of the American Short Story • Various

... of the Fran-beam, Abbott wanted to be alone, to meditate on stellar and solar brightness, but in this vociferous wilderness, reflection was impossible. One could not even escape recognition, one could not even detach oneself from ...
— Fran • John Breckenridge Ellis

... resigned herself to make the best of it, and it proved a poor best. She could not detach herself sufficiently from the sordid realities to lose herself in day-dreaming. There was not a book in the camp save some ten-cent sensations she found in the bunkhouse, and these she had exhausted during Charlie's first absence. The uncommon stillness of the camp oppressed ...
— Big Timber - A Story of the Northwest • Bertrand W. Sinclair

... and deeply felt whence this blow came, and whither it was aimed. In vain did he protest against this violation of the compact, to the Cardinal Infante; the Italian army continued its march, and he was forced to detach General Altringer to join it with a reinforcement. He took care, indeed, so closely to fetter the latter, as to prevent the Italian army from acquiring any great reputation in Alsace and Swabia; but this bold step of the court awakened him from his security, ...
— The History of the Thirty Years' War • Friedrich Schiller, Translated by Rev. A. J. W. Morrison, M.A.

... Marsh glanced at Nels, who showed appreciation of this defense of home-made strong drink by grinning at Marsh. The Secret Service man decided they would soon be friends, and quietly slipping his hand into his pocket, began to detach a bill. ...
— The Sheridan Road Mystery • Paul Thorne

... a plate at a distance of one metre from her right hand, which is held up in front of her. The red light is turned slightly low. The somnambule sees a shadowy hand detach itself from hers, which is at the same time, also, attached to a very long, thin arm, and which approaches the plate. The hand is very large, she says, and is a right hand. It places itself over the plate, which I thereupon remove and develop. A large hand is distinctly ...
— The Problems of Psychical Research - Experiments and Theories in the Realm of the Supernormal • Hereward Carrington

... to criticisms of the present state of affairs, to writing and talking of what the future must be and of certain results which should be obtained. In trying to better matters, however, they have in mind only political achievements which they detach in a curious way from the rest of life, and they speak and write of the purification of politics as of a thing set apart ...
— Democracy and Social Ethics • Jane Addams

... he refused to sit down quietly and await the arrival of the army from Lacedaemon, but at once marched with what troops he had against the walls of Haliartus; and in the first instance he tried to persuade the citizens to detach themselves from Thebes and to assume autonomy, but the intention was cut short by certain Thebans within the fortress. Whereupon Lysander attacked the place. The Thebans were made aware, (22) and hurried ...
— Hellenica • Xenophon

... there's a law of life that where there is sin, there is suffering. You can't detach those two things. Where there is suffering there has been sin somewhere. And where there is sin there will be suffering. You can't get these two things apart. Now," he went on, "you have done wrong. And I am in this home like God is in the world. So we will do this. You go up to the attic. ...
— Tiger and Tom and Other Stories for Boys • Various

... after reflection, I am persuaded that it will be better to put in nomination some one who can give more time to the affairs of the society than I can and who can at least attend its meetings, which I find it impossible to do. But, while I detach myself from the mere machinery of the society, I do not withdraw from the cause, nor abate my hopes of its success and my conviction of the justice of its aims. On the contrary, with every year I ...
— History of Woman Suffrage, Volume II • Elizabeth Cady Stanton, Susan B. Anthony, and Matilda Joslyn Gage

... sign from the hulk. Yet, excepting the watch, he kept every man so busy as might be, some bringing weed to keep up a fire which he had lit near the boat; one to help him turn and hold the batten upon which he labored; and two he sent across to the wreck of the mast, to detach one of the futtock shrouds, which (as is most rare) were made of iron rods. This, when they brought it, he bade me heat in the fire, and afterwards beat out straight at one end, and when this was done, he set me to burn holes with it ...
— The Boats of the "Glen Carrig" • William Hope Hodgson

... boom," said the King. "Go thou, summon hither the trustiest man in the fleet for such a purpose, let him detach as many men and ships as he deems needful, and go into yonder small fiord where there is a pine wood on the hillside. There let him make a long and strong boom of timber, while we are engaged in the fight. I will drive as many of the ships as I can into Horlingfiord, and ...
— Erling the Bold • R.M. Ballantyne

... profit in the case of operas; to publish such would in the case of "Lohengrin" be impossible on account of the peculiar character of the opera, in which there are no single vocal pieces that in a manner detach themselves from the context. I alone, being the composer, was able to separate a number of the most attractive vocal pieces from the whole by means of rearranging and cutting them and writing an introduction and a close to them, ...
— Correspondence of Wagner and Liszt, Volume 1 • Francis Hueffer (translator)

... white canvas jumper, trousers and wide sombrero of the Mexicans, or wearing the blue overalls and black shirt decorated with many brightly colored ribbons and the green, yellow or orange head cloth of the Indians, would detach itself from the main company and—coming nearer—would stand out with sudden startling clearness, disappearing again as suddenly in the dark mass as it ...
— The Winning of Barbara Worth • Harold B Wright

... more than once used the word prospecting, which, we believe, is peculiar to this kind of mining. The deposits of gold are so capricious, that the adventurers, in order to lose as little time as possible in removing from place to place, detach one of their number on the hunt for a mine—and this is called prospecting. He sets out with a few provisions, a rifle, a pick and shovel, at all events, with a pan and large knife; and on reaching some hopeful-looking locality, ...
— Chambers's Edinburgh Journal, No. 430 - Volume 17, New Series, March 27, 1852 • Various

... clear from Euseb., V. 16 ff. as well as from the later history of Montanism in its native land (see Jerome, ep. 41; Epiphan., H. 49. 2 etc.). In itself, however, apart from its particular explanation in the case of Montanus, the endeavour to detach Christians from the local Church unions has so little that is striking about it, that one rather wonders at being unable to point to any parallel in the earliest history of the Church. Wherever religious ...
— History of Dogma, Volume 2 (of 7) • Adolph Harnack

... well that the cable was all out. Our young readers may not all understand the meaning of Paul's question. If the vessel rides at anchor with a short cable, her motion, as she rises and falls with the sea, raises up the shaft of the anchor, which has a tendency to detach the flukes, or points from the bottom. But Paul had been careful the night before to give the Fawn all the cable he could spare; and it was evident, therefore, that the anchor was not heavy enough, or that there was no holding-ground at ...
— Little By Little - or, The Cruise of the Flyaway • William Taylor Adams

... done was to detach the truck half off the rails from the one completely so. To do this the engine had to be moved to slacken the strain on the twisted couplings. When these had been released, the next step was to drag the ...
— London to Ladysmith via Pretoria • Winston Spencer Churchill

... astral bodies do not separate immediately after death: they are held together for a time by the agency of a force the presence of which can be easily understood; for were this force not present the etheric body could not detach itself from the physical body. It would remain bound to the latter, as is shown in the case of sleep, when the astral body is not able to rend asunder these two principles of man's being. This force comes into action at death. It releases the etheric from the physical body, ...
— An Outline of Occult Science • Rudolf Steiner

... have a safe of that character in order to make his escape in the event of danger. He might keep a rope ladder stored inside, open the back door, throw out his ladder to a friend and by some trick arrangement could detach the ladder and allow the door to swing ...
— The Clue of the Twisted Candle • Edgar Wallace

... If our style of soldiering is to be only what it has been, I say we ought to disband at once of our own accord, and not wait to be driven from the field against our will by sheer lack of means. If we do wish to go forward, this is what we must do: we must detach from the enemy all the fortresses we can and secure all we can for our own: if this is done, the larger supply will be in the hands of those who can stow away the larger store, and the weaker will suffer siege. [16] At ...
— Cyropaedia - The Education Of Cyrus • Xenophon

... good service—it was, in fact, the very first tire that wheel had ever carried. Perhaps it cherished fond hopes of remaining in service as long as the wheel to which it clung—at least it resisted most strenuously all efforts to detach it. Both Glen and the man were moist with their efforts before it came away, and they accumulated still more dirt and moisture in applying its successor. But at last it was all done, and Glen had already mounted to the seat, while his companion ...
— The Boy Scout Treasure Hunters - The Lost Treasure of Buffalo Hollow • Charles Henry Lerrigo

... springs out of the misapplication of forces which might be turned to account by judicious training. The waste of sorrow is one of the most lamentable forms of waste. Sorrow too often tends to produce bitterness or effeminacy of character. But it may, if rightly used, serve only to detach us from the lower motives, and give sanctity to the higher. That is what Wordsworth sees with unequalled clearness, and he therefore sees also the condition of profiting. The mind in which the most valuable elements have been systematically strengthened ...
— Hours in a Library - New Edition, with Additions. Vol. II (of 3) • Leslie Stephen

... having done his best to detach the poor doctress from Vizard and his family, in which the reader probably discerns his true motive, now bent his mind on slipping back to Homburg and looking after his money. Not that he liked the job. To get hold of it, he knew he must condense rascality; he must play the penitent, ...
— The Woman-Hater • Charles Reade

... idea. As you know he hasn't been very well of late—the doctor says he is threatened with diabetes—so my one thought is to spare him every useless anxiety. He sleeps very badly and doesn't seem able, even at night, to detach his mind from his business worries. If he hadn't had such a bad summer, he might have been able to help you start housekeeping, but there have been a great many failures in the last few months, and he says ...
— Life and Gabriella - The Story of a Woman's Courage • Ellen Glasgow

... efficacy of the written Word as weighed against the preaching of the Gospel, the discipline of the Churches, the continued succession of the Ministry, and the communion of Saints, lest by comparing them I should seem to detach them; I tremble at the processes which the Grotian divines without scruple carry on in their treatment of the sacred writers, as soon as any texts declaring the peculiar tenets of our Faith are cited against them—even tenets and mysteries which the believer at his baptism receives ...
— Confessions of an Inquiring Spirit etc. • by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

... There are events that detach themselves from the general stream of occurrences and seem to partake of the nature of revelations. Such was this Parsons affair. It began by seeming grotesque; it ended disconcertingly. The fabric of Mr. Polly's daily life was torn, and beneath it he discovered ...
— The History of Mr. Polly • H. G. Wells

... have said of Dickens reminds me that I had been reading him at the same time that I had been reading Ik Marvel; but a curious thing about the reading of my later boyhood is that the dates do not sharply detach themselves one from another. This may be so because my reading was much more multifarious than it had been earlier, or because I was reading always two or three authors at a time. I think Macaulay a little antedated Dickens in my affections, but when I came to the novels of that masterful artist ...
— Henry James, Jr. • William Dean Howells

... set himself to prevent a plan which would detach a section of the Liberals from their former associates and permanently range them under a Conservative leader. He cannot be blamed for this. Confederation being now a fact, he considered himself under no obligation to continue an alliance proposed for a special ...
— The Fathers of Confederation - A Chronicle of the Birth of the Dominion • A. H. U. Colquhoun

... as Sylvane was sitting around the mess-wagon with a dozen other cowpunchers, a stranger came walking from the direction of Gladstone. The cow was hitched to the wagon, for she had shown a tendency to choose her own master. The stranger started to detach the rope ...
— Roosevelt in the Bad Lands • Hermann Hagedorn

... succession of miniature blizzards. After the heated office the tempestuous gale struck agreeably upon his face, and his mind, which he had kept closely upon his work until the hour of release, began almost with difficulty to detach itself from the fortunes of the Review. In the effort to compel rather than seek distraction, he put his imagination idly on the scent of the people in the street—ran down in fancy the history of a woman in a purple velvet gown and a bedraggled petticoat, catalogued an ...
— The Wheel of Life • Ellen Anderson Gholson Glasgow

... We detach this little descriptive gem from Sir Walter Scott's "Anne of Geierstein," just published. An outline of this very delightful novel will be found in a SUPPLEMENT with the present ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 13, - Issue 372, Saturday, May 30, 1829 • Various

... that all is over. Every citizen with whom one speaks, tells you that it will be the lasting shame of Paris that with its numerous army it not only failed to force the Prussians to raise the siege, but also allowed them whenever they pleased to detach corps d'armee against the French generals in the provinces. This, of course, is the fault of the Government of Trochu and of the Republic, and having thus washed his hands of everything that has occurred, the citizen goes on his way rejoicing. The Mobiles make no ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere

... And I had awful trouble to steal enough money to get about with. Why, I had to pick ever so many pockets, and I do hate touching people; you never can tell what germs they may have." She shook out her rusty black skirt as if to detach ...
— Out of the Ashes • Ethel Watts Mumford

... landing, and Mr. Shepson, left to himself, began a meditative progress about the room. On an easel facing the improvised dais stood a canvas on which a young woman's head had been blocked in. It was just in that happy state of semi-evocation when a picture seems to detach itself from the grossness of its medium and live a wondrous moment in the actual; and the quality of the head in question—a vigorous dusky youthfulness, a kind of virgin majesty—lent itself to this illusion of vitality. Stanwell, who had re-entered the ...
— The Hermit and the Wild Woman and Other Stories • Edith Wharton

... music as I am in paint; it was as big a chance for her as for me, you see, and she's making the most of it, fiddling and listening to the fiddlers. Well, it's a considerable change from New Hampshire." He looked at her dreamily, as if making an intense effort to detach himself from his dream, and situate her in the fading past. "Remember the bungalow? And Nick—ah, how's Nick?" ...
— The Glimpses of the Moon • Edith Wharton

... object with a wonderful intensity, seemingly completely absorbed in the subject or object before him, and oblivious to all else in the world. And yet, the task accomplished, or the given time expired, he will detach his mind from the object and will be perfectly fresh, watchful and wide-awake to the next matter before him. There is every difference between being controlled by involuntary attention, which is species of self-hypnotization, and the control of the attention, which is an evidence ...
— Clairvoyance and Occult Powers • Swami Panchadasi

... drawing-room was filled. Mr. Corbin Wood had come noiselessly in from the library, none was missing. Guests, family, and servants stood motionless. There was that in the bearing of the master which seemed, in the silence, to detach itself, and to come toward them like an emanation, cold, pure, and quiet, determined and imposing. He spoke. "I supposed that you had heard the news. Along the railroad and in Charlottesville it was known; there ...
— The Long Roll • Mary Johnston

... wait impatiently the arrival of Vice-admiral Pole from the Baltic to detach a powerful reinforcement to you, and we are not without hopes that four ships of the line are on their passage from Cork to join you before ...
— Memoirs and Correspondence of Admiral Lord de Saumarez. Vol II • Sir John Ross

... the end of May I received from Sir Frederick Roberts a letter in reply to mine, acknowledging the receipt of the Defence of India papers which I have named. I had told him that the real danger was that Russia would detach Herat by local intrigue without appearing, and that I did not see how we could prevent this alarming danger. Sir Frederick admitted the truth of my view, and again pointed out the importance of trying to win the friendship of the Afghans. He favoured my proposals for the delimitation of ...
— The Life of the Rt. Hon. Sir Charles W. Dilke, Vol. 2 • Stephen Gwynn

... for many other reasons, when I was speaking of the first degree of prayer, and of the first method of drawing the water, [14] I insisted upon it that the great affair of souls is, when they begin to pray, to begin also to detach themselves from every kind of joy, and to enter on it resolved only on helping to carry the cross of Christ like good soldiers, willing to serve their King without present pay, because they are sure of it at last, having ...
— The Life of St. Teresa of Jesus • Teresa of Avila

... them the time to trans-ship enough provisions; the weather was calm, the air was charged with dew, and when they cast off the ropes and set sail to a faint off-shore draught there was no flutter in the damp canvas; their old schooner seemed to detach itself gently from the stolen craft and slip away silently, together with the black mass of the coast, ...
— Lord Jim • Joseph Conrad

... imposition of the Stamp Act, and a failure to realise that the Thirteen Colonies had long outgrown a state of tutelage, and were not prepared to accept legislation from the motherland. But as a preliminary measure of offence, the newly assembled congress determined to detach Canada from the British crown, and, naturally, they counted most of all upon disaffection among the French Canadian population. It is not possible to give in full the letter which George Washington despatched on this occasion ...
— Old Quebec - The Fortress of New France • Sir Gilbert Parker and Claude Glennon Bryan

... detach one man to his side all would be well. Two against three would be a simple thing, as long as he was one of the two. But four against one—and such a four as these—was hopeless odds. There seemed little ...
— Way of the Lawless • Max Brand

... an endeavor to detach a bit of dull metal from the throat of the image, and scarcely ...
— Prisoners of Chance - The Story of What Befell Geoffrey Benteen, Borderman, - through His Love for a Lady of France • Randall Parrish

... was being driven straight toward the north. Whatever it was, it was driving fiercely ahead, as if impelled by a strong wind, though there was not a breath of air stirring below. Soon small objects began to detach themselves from the mass, so that the eye could distinguish separate particles, which looked not unlike scraps of silver driven with terrific force from the tail end of some gigantic machine. One of these scraps struck the girl on the cheek and she put her hand up quickly to feel the ...
— The Wind Before the Dawn • Dell H. Munger

... party "platform" or declaration of policy was and is thus formulated. Such machinery, which in England is likely always to play a less important part, has acquired an evil name. At the best there has always been a risk that a "platform" designed to detach voters from the opposite party will be an insincere and eviscerated document, by which active public opinion is rather muzzled than expressed. There has been a risk too that the "available" candidate should be some blameless nonentity, to whom no one objects, and whom therefore no one really ...
— Abraham Lincoln • Lord Charnwood

... to the jar so," said Maryllia, watching her thoughtfully; "They always did. I remember, as a child, seeing a man put his finger in to detach them. Don't put your finger in, Mrs. Tapple!—take a bit of wood—an old skewer or something. Oh, they're coming out all right! That's it!" And she popped one of the pear- drops into her mouth. "They are really ...
— God's Good Man • Marie Corelli

... to amuse travellers in Switzerland with the story that the concussion produced by the discharge of a gun or a cannon will sometimes detach these masses, and thus hasten the fall of an avalanche; and though the experiment is always tried when travellers pass these places, I never yet heard of a case in which the effect was really produced. ...
— Rollo in Switzerland • Jacob Abbott

... speech are not so very far removed. Their well-known tendency to alter their whole character in twenty years or less is due largely to the fluid nature of primitive utterance; it being found hard to detach portions, capable of repeated use in an unchanged form, from the composite vocables wherein they register ...
— Anthropology • Robert Marett

... they are convinced of the power and goodness of their Master, and nothing can shake their trust in Him. Without distinction or question they accept all as coming from God by special act or sovereign permission, to purify them, to detach them from the world and creatures, to increase their nearness and likeness to Himself, to multiply their merits for Heaven and bring them to everlasting crowns. They discover the workings of Providence everywhere, in things that are painful, as well as in ...
— The Shepherd Of My Soul • Rev. Charles J. Callan

... its shadow on the eye, Passing the source of light; and thence away, Succeeded quick by brighter still than they. For yet above these wafted clouds are seen (In a remoter sky, still more serene,) Others, detach'd in ranges through the air, Spotless as snow, and countless as they're fair; Scatter'd immensely wide from east to west, The beauteous 'semblance of a Flock at rest. These, to the raptur'd mind, aloud proclaim ...
— The Farmer's Boy - A Rural Poem • Robert Bloomfield

... frequently so much on the occasion on which it is spoken, on the particular manner of the speaker, on the person to whom it is applied, the previous introduction, and a thousand minute particulars which cannot be easily enumerated, that it is always dangerous to detach a witty saying from the group to which it belongs, and to set it before the eye of the spectator, divested of those concomitant circumstances, which gave it animation, mellowness, and relief. I ventured, however, at all hazards, to put down ...
— Life Of Johnson, Volume 5 • Boswell

... me one question," Kirby interrupted. "Say we was to gobble us up a bunch of strayin' Yankees along this road, what're we gonna do with 'em after? Four of us don't make no army, an' we ain't gonna be able to detach no prisoner guard. 'Course theah are them what's said from the first that the only good Yankees are them laid peacefullike in their graves. But I don't take natural to shootin' men what are holdin' up ...
— Ride Proud, Rebel! • Andre Alice Norton

... that Caesar was gaining ground attempted to attract the populace by various baits, to see if he could detach the people from his rival and number them among his own forces. Hence through Lucius Antonius, his brother, who was tribune, he introduced a measure that considerable land be opened for settlement, among the parcels being the region of the Pontine marshes, which he stated had already ...
— Dio's Rome, Vol. III • Cassius Dio

... of most of those who form the inverted cone have thus been adorned with ivory tablets, we shall see one of the bees, as though suddenly inspired, abruptly detach herself from the mass, and climb over the backs of the passive crowd till she reach the inner pinnacle of the cupola. To this she will fix herself solidly, dislodging, with repeated blows of her head, such of her neighbours as may seem to ...
— The Life of the Bee • Maurice Maeterlinck

... prudent. He had stood, not only for East Mickleham, but for a principle. It was an unpopular principle, and he knew it, and he had stuck to it all the same, with obstinacy and absurdity, in the teeth, the furiously gnashing teeth, of his constituency. You couldn't detach Mr. Higginson from his principle, and as long as he stuck to it a parliamentary career was closed to him. It was sad, for he had a passion for politics; he had chosen politics as the one field for the one ponderous ...
— The Return of the Prodigal • May Sinclair

... lived, so must he die, he told himself with some return of that philosophic quietude which had led him, stout-hearted and brave, through many dangers. And, at that moment when he had been striving to detach his thoughts from their vain task of conjuring up useless regrets, there had come what even now seemed to be the granting of his last passionate prayer. The man whom he had longed to see once more before his eyes were closed forever upon the world, with such ...
— A Monk of Cruta • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... shoulders. When she felt that hand, she cried, "Heuh!" and fainted. The executioner who was shedding large tears upon her, drop by drop, was about to bear her away in his arms. He tried to detach the mother, who had, so to speak, knotted her hands around her daughter's waist; but she clung so strongly to her child, that it was impossible to separate them. Then Rennet Cousin dragged the young girl outside the cell, and the mother after her. ...
— Notre-Dame de Paris - The Hunchback of Notre Dame • Victor Hugo

... Greek mind could grasp ideas,—this is the thoroughly artistic character of that people. Their philosophers were always outlaws. What excited the rage of the Athenians against Socrates was his endeavor to detach religion from the images of the gods. When it comes to comparisons between meaning and expression, as adequate or inadequate, it is evident their unity is gone;—the meaning is first, and the expression only adjunct ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 13, No. 76, February, 1864 • Various

... the "Purification of the Virgin," two of Luini's divinest frescos. Above them in lunettes are four Evangelists and four Latin Fathers, with four Sibyls. Time and neglect have done no damage here; and here, again, perforce we notice perfect mastery of color in fresco. The blues detach themselves too much, perhaps, from the rest of the coloring; and that is all a devil's advocate could say. It is possible that the absence of blue makes the St. Catherine frescos in the Monastero ...
— New Italian sketches • John Addington Symonds

... 14th Sir Bindon Blood joined the special force, and moved it on the 16th to Thana, a few miles further up the valley. At the same time he ordered Brigadier-General Wodehouse to detach a small column in the direction of the southern passes of Buner. The Highland Light Infantry, No.3 Company Bombay Sappers and Miners, and one squadron of the 10th Bengal Lancers accordingly marched from Mardan, where the 3rd Brigade then was, to Rustum. By this move ...
— The Story of the Malakand Field Force • Sir Winston S. Churchill

... state of opulent societies, to say to a man who knows by experience that riches procure every pleasure, that he must not desire them; that he must not make any efforts to obtain them; that he ought to detach himself from them: is to persuade him to render himself miserable. To tell an ambitious man not to desire grandeur, not to covet power, which every thing conspires to point out to him as the height of felicity, is to order him to overturn at one blow the habitual system of his ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 1 • Baron D'Holbach

... their discourse. And doggedly, blindly, they kept on with their studies. Corydon mastered new lists of German words, and they read Freitag's "Verlorene Handscrift" together, and von Scheffel's "Ekkehard", and even attempted "Iphigenie auf Tauris"—though in truth they found it difficult to detach themselves to quite that extent from the world of every-day. It is not an easy matter to experience the pure katharsis of tragedy, with a baby in the room who has to be nursed every hour or two, and who is liable to awaken at any ...
— Love's Pilgrimage • Upton Sinclair

... whole operation, as fast as you detach the skin from the body you must put cotton immediately betwixt the body and it; and this will effectually prevent any fat, blood or moisture from coming in contact with the plumage. Here it may be observed that on the belly you find an inner skin, which keeps the bowels ...
— Wanderings In South America • Charles Waterton

... let down, and the company thundered over it to draw up in the courtyard under the eyes of Galeotto. He issued his orders once more to his companions. Then calling for horses for himself and for me, and bidding a score of lances to detach themselves to ride with us, ...
— The Strolling Saint • Raphael Sabatini

... against great inventions of your own; for then you would try to give a view of things, and for that purpose youth is seldom ripe. Further, character and views detach themselves as sides from the poet's mind, and deprive him of the fulness requisite for future productions. And, finally, how much time is lost in invention, internal arrangement, and combination, for which nobody thanks us, even supposing our ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. II • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... believed that the king was really identified with the magnates, and that the Commons were totally unprepared to confront either the court or the approaching Revolution. He thought it hopeless to negotiate with his own doomed order, and meant to detach the king from them. When the scheme of conciliation failed, his opportunity came. He requested Malouet to bring him into communication with ministers. He told him that he was seriously alarmed, that the nobles meant to push resistance to extremity, and ...
— Lectures on the French Revolution • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton

... Somme were, however, in Louis's possession, and Charles of Burgundy, ready to reduce Amiens by siege on March 10, 1471, consented to stay his proceedings by striking a truce which was renewed in July. This afforded a valuable respite to the king, and he busied himself in energetic efforts to detach his brother from the group of malcontents. Various disquieting rumours about the prince's marriage projects caused his royal brother deep anxiety, and induced him to despatch a special envoy to Guienne. To that envoy Louis ...
— Charles the Bold - Last Duke Of Burgundy, 1433-1477 • Ruth Putnam

... could not be concealed from a woman like you," he went on, trying to detach his mind from material considerations such as the business value of the shop, and the amount of money Mr Verloc might have left in the bank. He applied himself to the sentimental side of the affair. In his heart of hearts he was a little shocked at his success. ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad

... mechanically, took one of the virginally cinctured cigars, and began to undo its wrappings. It was the first time he had ever been privileged to detach that golden girdle, and nothing could have given him a better measure of the importance of the situation, and of the degree to which he was apparently involved in it. "You remember that San Pablo rubber ...
— Tales Of Men And Ghosts • Edith Wharton

... corner, often the most ostentatious place, was deposited a huge wooden chest, ornamented and strengthened by bands of bronze or iron, and secured by strong hooks upon a stone pedestal so firmly as to defy the attempts of any robber to detach it from its position. It is supposed that this chest was the money-box, or coffer, of the master of the house; though as no money has been found in any of the chests discovered at Pompeii, it is probable that it was sometimes ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton

... spoilt by severity and coldness as by indulgence, and that the notion that natural parents are any worse than adopted parents is probably as complete an illusion as the notion that they are any better, see no serious likelihood that State action will detach children from their parents more than it does at present: nay, it is even likely that the present system of taking the children out of the parents' hands and having the parental duty performed by officials, will, as poverty and ignorance become the exception instead of the rule, give way ...
— Getting Married • George Bernard Shaw

... 'Here's where we carry our first trench,' says he; 'an' here, if wit o' man can grasp the why or the wherefore,' says he, 'is a filthy potato-patch lyin' slap across our line. Corporal,' says he to me, 'you're a family man an' tactful. I detach you,' says he, 'to search the blighter out an' request him to lift his crop without delay. If at first you don't succeed, try, try again,' says he, 'an' the more you run around the better it'll be for your figure, an' the more you'll thank me,' he winds up, 'when we march together into Berlin.' ...
— Nicky-Nan, Reservist • Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch (Q)

... now so decidedly on the side of James that he could safely venture to detach five regiments from his army, and to send them into Connaught. Sarsfield commanded them. He did not, indeed, stand so high as he deserved in the royal estimation. The King, with an air of intellectual superiority which must have made Avaux and Rosen bite ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... by a scarf round the neck and by dint of forcing their fingers into the furthest inch of their pockets. Then they would slowly lift one leg after the other. Starers of infirm purpose would occasionally detach themselves from the throng and sidle away, ashamed of their fickleness. But reinforcements were continually arriving. And to these new-comers all that had been said in gossip had to be repeated and repeated: the same questions, the same answers, the same exclamations, the same proverbial philosophy, ...
— The Old Wives' Tale • Arnold Bennett

... before she awoke that morning. The sense of something delightful in store pervaded even her dreams. For a long time she lingered in that delightful interim between waking and sleeping, when the spirit seems to detach itself and fly on wings of golden sunshine through a dewy, scented universe. In her confused imagining she was resting on a rose-colored cloud, while all around her other clouds of varying tints swam and swirled, taking different shapes as ...
— Lucile Triumphant • Elizabeth M. Duffield

... some permanently remaining parts, we remark that it would be impossible to determine which are the permanent and which the temporary parts.—We have further to ask from whence those particles originate when they accede to the soul, and into what they are merged when they detach themselves from it. They cannot spring from the material elements and re-enter the elements; for the soul is immaterial. Nor have we any means to prove the existence of some other, general or special, reservoir of soul-particles.—Moreover, on ...
— The Vedanta-Sutras with the Commentary by Sankaracarya - Sacred Books of the East, Volume 1 • George Thibaut

... appeared from thence, and again a bullet whistled past. The ABREKS were hiding in a marsh at the foot of the hill. Olenin was much impressed by the place in which they sat. In reality it was very much like the rest of the steppe, but because the ABREKS sat there it seemed to detach itself from all the rest and to have become distinguished. Indeed it appeared to Olenin that it was the very spot for ABREKS to occupy. Lukashka went back to his horse and ...
— The Cossacks • Leo Tolstoy

... with peacock's feathers; it was not the conversation going on between Alcock and the Governor; it was simply the way the latter, by his excessive dignity and dramatic manner, turned a simple action into a ceremony. What he did was to draw carefully from his official boot a wad of fine white paper, detach one sheet, and solemnly blow his nose upon it. The action was nothing, the method everything. He then proceeded to fold the paper into a cocked hat, and, calling a servant to him, gave it into his hands with a grand bow, just as if he were presenting ...
— Sir Robert Hart - The Romance of a Great Career, 2nd Edition • Juliet Bredon

... whom he introduced immediately to Mrs. Locke by the name of M. de la Chtre. The appearance of M. de la Chtre was something like a coup de thatre; for, despite our curiosity, I had no idea we should ever see him, thinking that nothing could detach him from the ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madame D'Arblay Volume 3 • Madame D'Arblay

... the King. You may easily imagine that this is interpreted to allude to a higher person than the mean people who have offended Lord Harcourt and the Bishop of Norwich. Great pains were taken to detach the former from the latter; "dear Harcourt, we love you, we wish to make you easy; but the Bishop must go." I don't tell you these were the Duke of Newcastle's words; but if I did, would they be unlike him? Lord Harcourt fired, and replied with spirit, ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole, Volume 2 • Horace Walpole

... she continued. "I have led the life to which it has pleased your Highness to restrict me. But I have not been able to detach my heart as well as my thoughts from your Highness's interests. I have not learned to ...
— The Valley of Decision • Edith Wharton

... summer which witnessed the investment of Plataea, the Spartans planned an expedition against Acarnania, the westernmost province of Greece, which they wished to detach from the Athenian alliance. A Spartan officer, named Cnemus, was sent off in advance, with a thousand hoplites, to raise the wild mountain tribes, and led an attack against Stratus, the capital of Acarnania; and in the meantime orders were ...
— Stories From Thucydides • H. L. Havell

... great factor in the situation; sooner or later, as in most revolutions, it was likely to prove the decisive one. From the first the pressure of the armed force on Paris had acted as a powerful irritant; and in reducing the power of the King nothing seemed more important than to detach the army from its allegiance. The mutiny and desertion of July 1789 gave the assembly a good starting point; in the spring of 1790 the troops were placed under oath to obey the law and the King, and not to act against ...
— The French Revolution - A Short History • R. M. Johnston

... called pragmatism can be expected of any man. The movement is still in a nebulous state, a state from which, perhaps, it is never destined to issue. The various tendencies that compose it may soon cease to appear together; each may detach itself and be lost in the earlier system with which it has most affinity. A good critic has enumerated "Thirteen Pragmatisms;" and besides such distinguishable tenets, there are in pragmatism echoes of various popular moral forces, like democracy, impressionism, ...
— Winds Of Doctrine - Studies in Contemporary Opinion • George Santayana

... them under the control of civilized influences. I see no reason why Indians who can give satisfactory proof of having by their own labor supported their families for a number of years, and who are willing to detach themselves from their tribal relations, should not be admitted to the benefit of the homestead act and the privileges of citizenship, and I recommend the passage of a law to that effect. It will be an act of justice ...
— Messages and Papers of Rutherford B. Hayes - A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents • James D. Richardson

... exponent and interpreter of a religion based on inward authority because he unites, in an unusual manner, the intellectual ideals of the Humanist with the experience and attitude of the Mystic. In him we have a Christian thinker who is able to detach himself from the theological formulations of his own and of earlier times, and who could draw, with breadth of mind and depth of insight, from the wells of the great original thinkers of all ages, and who, besides, in his own deep and ...
— Spiritual Reformers in the 16th & 17th Centuries • Rufus M. Jones

... troops, apparently without a commander, who were useful to us, for by not disturbing them we could create an impression of our weakness. But the movement on Jayhawk having isolated them, I was about to detach an Alabama regiment to bring them in, my division being the leading one, when an earth-shaking rumble was felt and heard, and suddenly the head-of-column was struck by one of the terrible tornadoes for which this region is famous, and utterly ...
— The Collected Works of Ambrose Bierce, Volume 8 - Epigrams, On With the Dance, Negligible Tales • Ambrose Bierce

... taken advantage of the dispersion of the boys to detach herself from Cashel's arm. She now said, speaking to him for the first time since ...
— Cashel Byron's Profession • George Bernard Shaw

... laboriously cuts his way through the dense forest ta the spot where he discovers a tree. Having freed the stem from adhering parasites and twining plants, he proceeds, by beating and cutting oblong pieces, to detach the stem bark as far as is within his reach. The tree is then felled, and the entire bark of stem and branches secured. The bark of the smaller branches, as it dries, curls up, forming "quills," the thicker masses from the stems ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various

... and hidden in caves and forests; the remote provinces threw off their allegiance to the Incas; the great captains at the head of distant armies set up for themselves—one named Ruminavi sought to detach Quito from the Peruvian Empire and assert its independence. Pizarro, still in Caxamalca, looked round for a successor to Atahuallpa, and chose his young brother Toparca, who was crowned with the usual ceremonies; ...
— The Red True Story Book • Various

... at the deck for a while. "All right. I'll detach every ship I can spare, and put you in charge. You'll have the transports too, as soon as they're unloaded." He stared after Jezef, wanting to call out to him to be sure to send word about Anatu and the boys, but somehow feeling he ...
— Tulan • Carroll Mather Capps

... sea powers which has been mentioned. The King of Portugal, moved by fear of the French, had acknowledged Philip V.; but his heart was against him, for he dreaded French influence and power brought so near his little and isolated kingdom. It had been a part of Rooke's mission to detach him from the alliance of the two crowns; and the affair of Vigo, happening so near his own frontiers, impressed him with a sense of the power of the allied navies. In truth, Portugal is nearer to the sea than to Spain, and must fall naturally ...
— The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 • A. T. Mahan

... become used to a new presence—a very big, very kind personality that hauntingly resembled the Americano—it was, of course, one of those phantoms that appear before fevered imaginations. He realized that, and now he made an effort to detach the dream ...
— The Title Market • Emily Post

... soldier." The Turks had two hundred thousand men in their camp, raw recruits. Eugene had sixty thousand veteran soldiers. He decided to drive off the Turks who annoyed him. It was necessary for him to detach twenty thousand to hold in check the garrison of Belgrade, who might sally to the relief of their companions. This left him but forty thousand troops with whom to assail two hundred thousand strongly intrenched. He did not hesitate ...
— The Empire of Austria; Its Rise and Present Power • John S. C. Abbott

... perhaps whirling like a great fiery maelstrom toward its centre, or swirling in an outward movement away from its centre. Again it may be seen as projecting from its depths smaller bodies or centres of mental vibration, which like sparks from a furnace detach themselves from the parent flame, and travel far away in other directions—these are the projected thought-forms of which all occultists are fond of speaking and which make plain ...
— The Human Aura - Astral Colors and Thought Forms • Swami Panchadasi

... one I address myself and say: Will you, to begin with, drop your burden of preconceived opinions and prejudices, whatever they are? Will you set aside the small cares and trifles that affect your own material personality? Will you detach yourself from your own private and particular surroundings for a space and agree to THINK with me? Thinking is, I know, the hardest of all hard tasks to the modern mind. But if you would learn, you must undertake this trouble. If you would find the path which is made ...
— The Life Everlasting: A Reality of Romance • Marie Corelli

... itself with crying down this world, with its splendid beauty, its thrilling interests, its glorious works, its noble and holy affections; nor exhort us to detach our hearts from this earthly life, as empty, fleeting, and unworthy, and fix them upon Heaven, as the only sphere deserving the love of the loving or the meditation of the wise. It teaches that man has high duties to perform, and a high destiny to fulfill, on this earth; that this world is ...
— Morals and Dogma of the Ancient and Accepted Scottish Rite of Freemasonry • Albert Pike

... passed entirely across the greater orb, and then I was surprised to see it detach itself from the planet and remain for a few moments as a separate small orb in the sky! Could this be another freak of refraction? But before I could determine, the little orb disappeared behind the greater disc and ...
— Pharaoh's Broker - Being the Very Remarkable Experiences in Another World of Isidor Werner • Ellsworth Douglass

... speak. He was wearing, arranged across his heavy paunch, a handsome chain of gold. With fingers stiff from their hold upon the dock-rail he began, bunglingly, to detach this chain from his waistcoat. His watch came out with it—a big watch, with a double gold case. He opened the outer case in an aimless way, mechanically, and for no object, it seemed, for he did not look at the time. Then, without a word he held out the watch and chain to his friend, and ...
— Mrs. Day's Daughters • Mary E. Mann

... that power, sir, more largely than yourself. What organs we have we can detach on any service. When dispersed, a simple force of Nature directs all corresponding members whither to fly that they ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 1, No. 2, July, 1850. • Various

... himself to be treated almost as a child, eating and drinking mechanically what was set before him, hardly conscious of my presence, unable to detach his thoughts from the sombre picture in the adjoining apartment. At last he had finished, and I said gently, "Have you made arrangements for ...
— For The Admiral • W.J. Marx

... you the correspondence about it between the bishop and this charlatan of twopenny Atheism? No? Well it is a tit-bit, and I give it to you! Petit sent his order to the keeper of the cemetery of the Madeleine in November 1880, to raze the cross, saw off the arms, and detach from it the image of Christ. He was then, observe, not really mayor of Amiens, but only mayor by reason of the refusal of his senior to ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert

... point of the pick was barely two feet above the ground. He then let it fall—simply by its own weight—producing a tiny indentation such as might be caused by the kick of one's heel It required about three such strokes, if they could so called strokes, to detach one single small stone. After that exhausting labor the man stood at ease for a few minutes, so that there were often three or four at once staring about them, while several others lounged against the wooden railing placed to keep ...
— Hodge and His Masters • Richard Jefferies

... not droop and detach itself and sink into the ground. Instead, tufted and fluffy, like dandelion seed or thistledown, it floated upward in incredible quantities, so that for hundreds of miles the sky was obscured by this cloud bearing the ...
— Greener Than You Think • Ward Moore

... from early dawn far into the hours of night, to obtain bread for themselves and those who are dearer to them than life, and who have never been instructed, even in the first rudiments of science. Yet, are they conscious of possessing bright gems of thought, which they find it impossible to detach from the dust and rubbish and cobwebs of ignorance, with which their minds are filled. There are many such, who, bound down by the grinding hand of oppression, which would, if it were possible, crush ...
— Withered Leaves from Memory's Garland • Abigail Stanley Hanna

... Now, this crumbling was arrested by putting over it a coating of tough, gelatinous substance, over which a sheet of muslin was placed, the gelatinous substance acting also upon the charred sheet in such a way as to detach it from the rest of the scroll. In this way it was unrolled slowly and carefully, two inches at a time, and on being unrolled a facsimile copy was at once made. Of course there was no attempt to preserve the manuscripts; they were, too perishable; ...
— Among the Brigands • James de Mille

... others, of hanging all the rebels, without exception, and without mercy; and, in fine, others, invited Spain, Switzerland, and the King of Piedmont, to come and reduce France to reason; they contributed not less powerfully than the success of the imperial army, to detach from the cause of the Bourbons every Frenchman, who was an enemy to treachery, ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. I • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon

... extraordinary rigour. A he-wolf who becomes enamoured of a female from another tribe is forced, in attempting to wed her, to set his life upon the venture, and, disdaining all the fury of her numerous relatives, he must forcibly detach her from her family, kill or maim all her other suitors, sustain in a wounded and desperate condition a prolonged chase over the snow-clad Russian Steppes, and, ultimately, consummate his nuptials, if he can, with as many limbs as his lady's ...
— Here are Ladies • James Stephens

... thus set before Mr. Saunders was a grave one. Upon the one hand, he was asked to detach half of the already inadequate garrisons of Fort Saint David and Madras upon an enterprise which, if unsuccessful, must be followed by the loss of the British possessions, of which he was governor. He would have to take this ...
— With Clive in India - Or, The Beginnings of an Empire • G. A. Henty

... all deservedly, pelted with any fragment of his botch the critic shall choose to pick up. But his ground once conquered, in this particular field, he knows nothing of fragments and may say in all security: "Detach one if you can. You can analyse in YOUR way, oh yes—to relate, to report, to explain; but you can't disintegrate my synthesis; you can't resolve the elements of my whole into different responsible agents or find your way at all (for your own fell purpose). My mixture has ...
— The Awkward Age • Henry James

... they were affected, by passing incidents. There being now no force in the field, but the two hundred light infantry, under Gen. Huger, and the horse under Col. Washington; which were those mentioned in Lincoln's order to Gen. Marion; the British were suffered to detach small parties through the country, and to take all the horses which were fit, either to transport their cannon and baggage, or to mount their cavalry. In one month after their landing, Col. Tarleton had his legion mounted, and began his career of slaughter. ...
— A Sketch of the Life of Brig. Gen. Francis Marion • William Dobein James

... terrible Albani was too much feared, and had his own party too well in hand. But the thing was run very close. The danger was great that during the hours of the night that must intervene before the next scrutiny some means might be found to detach one Albani follower from his allegiance. There was the great bait to be offered that the one who changed his vote would be in effect the maker of the new pope. Under these circumstances, Albani ...
— Lippincott's Magazine Of Popular Literature And Science, April 1875, Vol. XV., No. 88 • Various

... open of which may not be vital to this country. What will be our position then? We have not kept a fleet in the Mediterranean which is equal to dealing alone with a combination of other fleets in the Mediterranean. It would be the very moment when we could not detach more ships to the Mediterranean, and we might have exposed this country from our negative attitude at the present moment to the most appalling risk. I say that from the point of view of British interests. We feel strongly that France was entitled to know—and to know at once—whether ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War from the Beginning to March 1915, Vol 1, No. 2 - Who Began the War, and Why? • Various

... and only securing its supplies with difficulty, for five weeks and three days. During all that time they were subject to most pressing attentions on the part of the Bosches, but they never lost a yard of trench. They received word from Headquarters that to detach another regiment for their relief would seriously weaken other and most important dispositions. The Commander-in-Chief would therefore be greatly obliged if they could hold on. So they ...
— The First Hundred Thousand • Ian Hay

... thee wait in anxious grief Till the slow plague shall bring the fatal hour. Glide softly to thy rest then; Death should come Gently, to one of gentle mould like thee, As light winds wandering through groves of bloom Detach the delicate blossom from the tree. Close thy sweet eyes, calmly, and without pain; And we will trust in God to ...
— Poems • William Cullen Bryant



Words linked to "Detach" :   snap off, fall off, war machine, disconnect, divide, unhook, lop off, come off, separate, attach, chop off, come away, cut off



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