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Agitate   /ˈædʒətˌeɪt/   Listen
Agitate

verb
(past & past part. agitated; pres. part. agitating)
1.
Try to stir up public opinion.  Synonyms: foment, stir up.
2.
Cause to be agitated, excited, or roused.  Synonyms: charge, charge up, commove, excite, rouse, turn on.
3.
Exert oneself continuously, vigorously, or obtrusively to gain an end or engage in a crusade for a certain cause or person; be an advocate for.  Synonyms: campaign, crusade, fight, press, push.  "She is crusading for women's rights" , "The Dean is pushing for his favorite candidate"
4.
Move very slightly.  Synonyms: budge, shift, stir.
5.
Move or cause to move back and forth.  Synonym: shake.  "My hands were shaking"
6.
Change the arrangement or position of.  Synonyms: commove, disturb, raise up, shake up, stir up, vex.






WordNet 3.0 © 2010 Princeton University








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"Agitate" Quotes from Famous Books



... leaf; shake to its center, shake to its foundations; be the sport of the winds and waves; reel to and fro like a drunken man; move from post to pillar and from pillar to post, drive from post to pillar and from pillar to post, keep between hawk and buzzard. agitate, shake, convulse, toss, tumble, bandy, wield, brandish, flap, flourish, whisk, jerk, hitch, jolt; jog, joggle, jostle, buffet, hustle, disturb, stir, shake up, churn, jounce, wallop, whip, vellicate[obs3]. Adj. shaking &c. v.; agitated tremulous; desultory, subsultory|; ...
— Roget's Thesaurus

... Union as the forty-sixth state. Oklahoma is an Indian word meaning Redman. It was part of the Louisiana Purchase, and had been set aside as an Indian reservation. All the land, however, was not occupied and as some of it was exceedingly fertile the white people began to agitate to have it opened to them. So at length the Indians gave up their claim to part of this territory in return for a sum ...
— This Country Of Ours • H. E. Marshall Author: Henrietta Elizabeth Marshall

... and latch-keys," exploded Mrs. Honeychurch. "And agitate and scream, and be carried off kicking by the police. And call it a Mission—when no one wants you! And call it Duty—when it means that you can't stand your own home! And call it Work—when thousands ...
— A Room With A View • E. M. Forster

... the power of one of earth to give. The changes in the poor child's countenance showed that it had few minutes to live. Sometimes it lay so still I thought the last pang was over; when a slight convulsion would agitate its frame, and a momentary pressure of its little hands, would give the gasping father a short ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, No. - 581, Saturday, December 15, 1832 • Various

... millions of men and women at home are heroically bearing their losses and are sending up urgent prayers to the Almighty for the speedy termination of the war, certain leaders of the people and the people's representatives agitate against the German Alliance, which has so splendidly stood the test, pass resolutions which no longer have the slightest connection with the state idea, find no word of blame for the Czech troops which criminally fight against their own country ...
— Independent Bohemia • Vladimir Nosek

... never let up?" said Withers. "Their howl now is, 'Put down the rebellion! but don't tech slavery, and don't bring in the nigger!' As if, arter dogs had been killing my sheep, you should preach to me, 'Save your sheep, neighbor, but don't agitate the dog question! You mustn't tech the dogs!' I say, if the dogs begin the trouble, they must take the consequences, even if ...
— Cudjo's Cave • J. T. Trowbridge

... tumultuous passions and quick sensations have subsided with me, and that I have no tormenting cares nor boisterous pleasures to agitate me, my greatest joy is to consider the fair prospect you have before you, and to hope and believe you will enjoy it. You are already in the world, at an age when others have hardly heard of it. Your character is hitherto not only unblemished in its mortal part, but even unsullied by any low, dirty, ...
— The PG Edition of Chesterfield's Letters to His Son • The Earl of Chesterfield

... hopes of success. It is of importance that they should succeed in their first trials, otherwise they will be discouraged from repeating their attempts, and they will distrust their own memory in future. The fear of not remembering, will occupy, and agitate, and weaken their minds; they should, therefore, be animated by hope. If they fail, at all events let them not be reproached; the mortification they naturally feel, is sufficient: nor should they be left to dwell upon their disappointment; they should have ...
— Practical Education, Volume II • Maria Edgeworth

... in a new and severe contest with error. Satisfied if they themselves can escape from the hard labor of thought, they willingly abandon to others the guardianship of their thoughts. And if it happens that nobler necessities agitate their soul, they cling with a greedy faith to the formula that the state and the church hold in reserve for such cases. If these unhappy men deserve our compassion, those others deserve our just contempt, ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... that a private grief should agitate you so deeply? Think how fortune has hitherto dealt with us. Reflect that we have had snatchcd from us what ought to be no less dear to human beings than their children—country, honour, rank, every ...
— Letters of Cicero • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... said Mr Inglis, "only don't be so impetuous; go quietly after the butterfly till you get within reach, and then press the net down firmly and quickly, or close it over the prize. If you go so impetuously you agitate the air, and drive a volume of it before you, which not only alarms the insect, but helps to force it ...
— Hollowdell Grange - Holiday Hours in a Country Home • George Manville Fenn

... made up, that the nation roused itself and "shook its mighty mane." The reign of the Stuarts indeed did much to create a more general and continuous attention to public affairs. In the strife of the Exclusion Bill and in the Popish Plot Shaftesbury taught how to "agitate" opinion, how to rouse this lagging attention, this dormant energy of the people at large; and his opponents learned the art from him. The common statement that our two great modern parties, the Whig ...
— History of the English People, Volume VII (of 8) - The Revolution, 1683-1760; Modern England, 1760-1767 • John Richard Green

... whole flow, and additional companies were asking for further grants. Permission for forty per cent of the whole volume of water had been granted. J. Horace McFarland, as President of the American Civic Association, called Bok's attention to the matter, and urged him to agitate it through his magazine so that restrictive ...
— The Americanization of Edward Bok - The Autobiography of a Dutch Boy Fifty Years After • Edward William Bok

... "containing true ideas on politics" for the students of Lahore, as well as for assistance towards defraying the cost of "political missionaries." In one of these letters also Lajpat Rai, after remarking that "the people are in a sullen mood" and that "the agricultural classes have begun to agitate," adds significantly that his "only fear is that the bursting out may not be premature." Lajpat Rai's correspondent was another prominent Arya, Bhai Parmanand, who, whilst he was Professor at the Dayanand Anglo-Vedic College, was found in possession of various formulae for the manufacture ...
— Indian Unrest • Valentine Chirol

... changeless green, and grasping close the rock, Up towers the mountain pine. The Winter blast May like an ocean surge be on it cast; Proud doth it stand, and stern defy the shock, Unchanged in verdure and unbroke in crest, Although wild throes may agitate its breast, And clinging closer when the storm is gone, Tired, but unbent upon its granite throne, Not always doth it wrestle with the storm! Skies smile; spring flowers make soft its iron roots; Its sturdy boughs are ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 3, February, 1851 • Various

... 3 deg.. Hot water at the feet, and a little brandy or whisky given before the sponging if the pulse be feeble, will generally prevent a chill. Patients should be gently dried after the bath and covered with dry bedclothing. The utmost care should be taken not to agitate ...
— The Home Medical Library, Volume I (of VI) • Various

... content. It can be found among men. Who does not know good-natured, ignorant, healthy fellows, who will work all day in the field, whistle all the way homeward, eat hugely of course food, sleep like logs, and take no more interest in the great questions which agitate the most of us, than the pigs they feed, and that, in return, feed them? Who has not sighed, as he has seen how easily the simple wants of certain simple natures are supplied? I remember an old man who quite unexpectedly was drafted into the ...
— Lessons in Life - A Series of Familiar Essays • Timothy Titcomb

... world. And as his arrows unobstructed by the bodies of foes always passed through them, so his car, unimpeded by hostile ranks, always passed through the latter. And, indeed, he began to toss about and agitate the hostile troops with great violence like the thousand-headed Vasuki sporting in the great ocean. And as Kiritin incessantly shot his shafts, the noise of the bow-string, transcending every sound, was so loud that ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli

... and creakless slipper; submit to search for pins and needles you never carried; promise you will only talk just so much, and stay only just so long, and will sit only just in such a place and won't attempt to agitate her, "for we must still be very, very careful," and at last you are admitted, and you kneel by the white bed and hear the rapturous ecstasy of welcome in her faint voice, and read of her sacred martyrdom ...
— Marion's Faith. • Charles King

... who had served in Hungary, and other bands of soldiers had entered Ratisbon; cannon came up the Danube from Austria, and the city, had gained a warlike aspect. To disturb the Emperor in his work as a general at such a time, with a matter which must agitate him so deeply, was hazardous, and few would have been bold enough to bring it before the overburdened monarch; but the leech's interest in Barbara was so warm and sincere that he allowed himself to be persuaded to ...
— Uarda • Georg Ebers

... article saying that the object of the London stage is "to introduce living pictures to say pretty things for young girls," and that "of the social, religious, economic or intellectual struggles which agitate our time no trace is observable in the English stage literature of the day," and that English stage literature "has become nothing more than an insipid and dying study of the doings of the aristocratic and the rich." How sickening to know that in the main the charges are true, and that ...
— Our Stage and Its Critics • "E.F.S." of "The Westminster Gazette"

... Marathonian tale appears, While his eyes sparkle with heroic tears. [79] And who, that walks where men of ancient days Have wrought with godlike arm the deeds of praise, 290 Feels not the spirit of the place control, Or rouse [80] and agitate his labouring soul? Say, who, by thinking on Canadian hills, Or wild Aosta lulled by Alpine rills, On Zutphen's plain; or on that highland dell, 295 Through which rough Garry cleaves his way, can tell What high resolves exalt the tenderest thought Of him whom passion rivets ...
— The Poetical Works of William Wordsworth - Volume 1 of 8 • Edited by William Knight

... clever writer in the New York "Tribune" declares, the present condition of women who "agitate." Their Celery and Cherubs are tears and temper. It is a good hit, and we may well make a note of it. It is the danger of all reformers, that they will vibrate between discouragement and anger. When things go wrong, what is it one's impulse to do? To be cast down, ...
— Women and the Alphabet • Thomas Wentworth Higginson

... believe the present frightful condition of the country to be due to the work of agitators and demagogues? Mr. Cleveland of course knows better; but many people have actually been convinced that some millions of our citizens would rather agitate than work; that thousands of them have deliberately and by preference forsworn business and become demagogues by trade. The thoughtful man knows that agitation is first a result and afterward a cause. It is a cruel ...
— The Arena - Volume 18, No. 92, July, 1897 • Various

... latly sent 2. of our body unto you, to agitate & bring to an issue some maters in difference betweene us, about some lands at Conightecutt, unto which you lay challeng; upon which God by his providence cast us, and as we conceive in a faire way of providence tendered it to us, as a ...
— Bradford's History of 'Plimoth Plantation' • William Bradford

... would have ended. Neither Boers or natives understand our namby-pamby way of playing at government; they put it down to fear. What they want, and what they expect, is to be governed with a just but a firm hand. Thus when the Boers found that they could agitate with impunity, they naturally enough continued to agitate. Anybody who knows them will understand that it was very pleasant to them to find themselves in possession of that delightful thing, a grievance, and, instead of stopping quietly at home on their farms, to feel obliged ...
— Cetywayo and his White Neighbours - Remarks on Recent Events in Zululand, Natal, and the Transvaal • H. Rider Haggard

... "Don't agitate yourself, my dear!" said Marya Konstantinovna, sitting down beside her and taking her hand. "It will pass. Men are just as weak as we poor sinners. You are both going through a crisis. . . . One can so well understand it! Well, my ...
— The Duel and Other Stories • Anton Chekhov

... not pressing your request," he said. "It is surely enough that you know the result of the instructions. Why should you agitate yourself to no purpose by reading them? They are expressed so cruelly; they show such abominable want of feeling, that I really cannot prevail upon myself to let you ...
— No Name • Wilkie Collins

... Then I began to agitate for an early marriage. Why wait? Lady Thesiger told me laughingly that there was much to do at Crown Anstey before I could take ...
— Coralie • Charlotte M. Braeme

... you must not excite yourself about a mere mistake,' I returned, anxious to soothe her. 'I cannot tell you how it came into my head; that is my little secret, Gladys, my dear: if you agitate yourself at a word we shall never understand each other. I want you to trust me as you would trust a dear sister,—we are sisters in heart, Gladys,'—but here I blushed over my words and wished them unuttered,—'and to tell me exactly what has ...
— Uncle Max • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... disappointments are lost in that initial day, whose span is golden from sun to sun; a lapse to be remembered with quiet satisfaction in trials to come. Indeed, a moment's reflection will assure any contemplative mind that resentment is the most pitiful passion that can agitate the human breast. True, there is such a thing as 'spirit,' but how often is it ill-directed! How often magnified by little causes into an importance wholly incommensurate with the object desired! It is the province of new-year visits to crush these poisonous weeds of our path, to quench their ...
— The Knickerbocker, or New-York Monthly Magazine, January 1844 - Volume 23, Number 1 • Various

... "Don't agitate yourself," said Jack. "It's all serene. He is thoroughly enjoying himself. Where are you two off to? Going to sit out in the dark? Shall I ...
— The Rocks of Valpre • Ethel May Dell

... courtiers, "attach consciences, recompense capitulations, organize about the mistress an emulation of devotion and servility by means of prodigality of the favors of the king and the money of the state; but what was a more burdensome task,—she must occupy the king, aid and agitate him, fight off constantly, from day to day and hour ...
— Women of Modern France - Woman In All Ages And In All Countries • Hugo P. Thieme

... agitate a more phlegmatic youth than he. He leant over the wicket which came in his path, and endeavoured to comprehend the ...
— Two on a Tower • Thomas Hardy

... somewhat astonished Ronald, accustomed to the more phlegmatic temperaments of the north. He tried to comfort him, but in vain, and when the surgeon came he intimated to Ronald that he had better leave him, as talking to a stranger seemed to agitate him in an ...
— Ronald Morton, or the Fire Ships - A Story of the Last Naval War • W.H.G. Kingston

... it was apparent that each party believed power, sovereignty, liberty, peace, and security;—things most dear to the human heart;—to be staked on the question depending before the public. From that oblivion which is the common destiny of fugitive pieces, treating on subjects which agitate only for the moment, was rescued, by its peculiar merit, a series of essays which first appeared in the papers of New York. To expose the real circumstances of America, and the dangers which hung over the republic; to detect the numerous ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 4 (of 5) • John Marshall

... solemn, as it varied sound, Fill'd his fond heart with reveries profound; He felt the infinitude of thoughts that pass And guide and govern that enormous mass. The cares that agitate, the creeds that blind, The woes that waste the many-master'd kind, The distance great that still remains to trace, Ere sober sense can harmonize the race, Held him suspense, imprest with reverence meek, And choked his utterance as he wish'd to speak: When Hesper thus: The paths they here pursue, ...
— The Columbiad • Joel Barlow

... finding an intruder forcing an entrance, does its utmost to drive it back through the door. Then the lungs, which would be destroyed by its getting to them, come to the assistance of the faithful servant who is struggling for their protection: they agitate themselves violently, and send forth gusts of air which drive all before them. Thence arises the cough, and by this means at last the enemy is thrust out of the mouth, like dust before the wind. And it is only when the ...
— The History of a Mouthful of Bread - And its effect on the organization of men and animals • Jean Mace

... Gibraltar from it; and the same in America, fighting for twenty-one years. And he asked them what they had to fight with against all those guns and arms?—nothing but a stump of a stick that they might cut down below in the wood. So he bid them give up their nightwalking, and come out and agitate ...
— Poets and Dreamers - Studies and translations from the Irish • Lady Augusta Gregory and Others

... Countess, in a tone of voice which betrayed one of those emotions which are rare in our lives, and which agitate every part of our being. At such moments the heart, fibres, nerves, countenance, soul, and body, everything, every pore even, feels a thrill. Life no longer seems to be within us; it flows out, springs forth, ...
— Colonel Chabert • Honore de Balzac

... though he could confidently reckon on getting it, he is happy; but if difficulties come in the way, he is miserable. What lies beyond his horizon has no effect at all upon him. So it is that the vast possessions of the rich do not agitate the poor, and conversely, that a wealthy man is not consoled by all his wealth for the failure of his hopes. Riches, one may say, are like sea-water; the more you drink the thirstier you become; and the same is true of fame. The loss of wealth and prosperity leaves a man, as soon as the ...
— The Essays Of Arthur Schopenhauer: The Wisdom of Life • Arthur Schopenhauer

... in order to secure the freedom of grace. Yesterday he agitated for the abolition of slavery, to-day he agitates for negro suffrage, negro equality, and announces that when he has secured that he will agitate for female suffrage and the equality of the sexes, forgetting or ignorant that the relation of equality subsists only between individuals of the same sex; that God made the man the head of the woman, and the woman for the man, ...
— The American Republic: Its Constitution, Tendencies, and Destiny • A. O. Brownson

... her spiritual welfare. She constantly deplored her lukewarmness, and regarded herself as standing on the edge of a precipice from which she had no power to withdraw. The subject of slavery began now also to agitate her mind. After her residence in Philadelphia, where doubtless she had to listen to some sharp reflections on the Southern institution, it seemed more than ever abhorrent to her, but it does not appear that she gave utterance to her feelings on more than one ...
— The Grimke Sisters - Sarah and Angelina Grimke: The First American Women Advocates of - Abolition and Woman's Rights • Catherine H. Birney

... distinguished success. Besides the devastation of their lands, this additional blow also befell the Sabines. Fabius Quintus was sent to Algidum as successor to Minucius. Towards the end of the year the tribunes began to agitate the question of the law; but because two armies were abroad, the patricians carried the point, that no business should be proposed to the people. The commons succeeded in electing the same tribunes for the fifth time. They report that wolves seen in the Capitol were driven away ...
— The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 • Titus Livius

... following this, the States of Mexico, Central America, and parts of South America, tiring of the incessant revolutions and difficulties among themselves, which had pretty constantly looked upon us as a big brother on account of our maintenance of the Monroe doctrine, began to agitate for annexation, knowing they would retain control of their local affairs. In this they were vigorously supported by the American residents and property-holders, who knew that their possessions would double ...
— A Journey in Other Worlds • J. J. Astor

... and merriment and light, The ladies, their fantastic dress, Also their feet—yet ne'ertheless Scarcely in Russia can ye find Three pairs of handsome female feet; Ah! I still struggle to forget A pair; though desolate my mind, Their memory lingers still and seems To agitate me in my dreams. ...
— Eugene Oneguine [Onegin] - A Romance of Russian Life in Verse • Aleksandr Sergeevich Pushkin

... there was no question of putting her under restraint, nor, indeed, could she be certified by any doctor as insane. She would have to have a trained attendant, she would live a secluded life, from which must be kept as far as possible anything that could agitate or distress her, and after that there was nothing more that could be done except to wait for the inevitable development of her malady. This might come quickly or slowly; there was no means of forecasting that, though the rapid deterioration of her brain, ...
— Michael • E. F. Benson

... treatment of the subject of love that the change is most conspicuous. The subtleties of passion are now realised for the first time. We are shown the private emotions, the secret alternations of hope and despair which agitate the breasts of man and maid, and, more important still, we find these emotions at work under the restraint of social conditions; the violent torrent of passion checked and confined by the demands of etiquette and the conventions of aristocratic life. The relation between ...
— John Lyly • John Dover Wilson

... the saving gift of tact is wanting, the brilliant, the witty, the ambitious, and the energetic are passed in the race of life by men who in intellectual qualities are greatly their inferiors. They dazzle, agitate, and in a measure influence, and they easily win places in the second rank; but something in the very exercise of their talents continually trammels them, while judgment, tact, and good-nature, with ...
— The Map of Life - Conduct and Character • William Edward Hartpole Lecky

... lips of John Stuart Mill, can we imagine a state of society, not totally Utopian, in which the individual man need be less ashamed of his social fetters, in which he could more freely utter all his honest convictions, more boldly propound all his theories, more fearlessly agitate for their speedy realization; in which, in fact, each man can be so entirely himself as the society of England, such as it now is, such as generations of hard-thinking and hard-working Englishmen have made it, and left it ...
— Chips From A German Workshop, Vol. V. • F. Max Mueller

... fashionable mother was prevailed upon to attempt nursing one of her poor starving infants; but the first trial proved also the last, as she declared nothing upon earth should ever induce her to perform so odious an office; and as Henry's entreaties and her aunts' remonstrances served alike to irritate and agitate her, the contest was, by the advice of her medical attendant, completely given up. A wet-nurse was therefore procured; but as she refused to undertake both children, and the old gentleman would not hear of having two such encumbrances in his family, it was settled, to the unspeakable delight ...
— Marriage • Susan Edmonstone Ferrier

... in the country, offered to the Government to accuse Fassifern of the murder. The writer of the anonymous letter to Fassifern is styled 'Blarmachfildich,' or 'Blarmackfildoch,' in the correspondence. I think he was a Mr. Millar, employed by Fassifern to agitate against Glenure. ...
— Historical Mysteries • Andrew Lang

... would not hear of it; the request seemed at first to agitate and distress him; but when still urged in defiance of his peremptory refusal, he burst into a violent fit of fury; he spoke darkly of great sacrifices which he had made, and threatened that if the request were ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume I. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu

... enemies whom he has conquered. A ridiculously false story is almost constantly followed by a charge of lying; a quarrel is the consequence; and the conversation is generally terminated with some blows of the poignard. They can never agitate even the most indifferent question, without having their eyes inflamed with rage. Fury is depicted in every the least motion, and they cannot even converse upon domestic affairs, without roaring and ...
— Perils and Captivity • Charlotte-Adelaide [nee Picard] Dard

... the correctness of his calculations. This occurrence had never been witnessed but twice before by an inhabitant of our earth, and was never to be again seen by any person then living. A phenomenon so rare, and so important in its bearings upon astronomical science, was, indeed, well calculated to agitate the soul of one so alive as he was to the great truths of nature. The day arrived, and there was no cloud on the horizon. The observers, in silence and trembling anxiety, awaited for the predicted moment of observation to arrive. It came, and in the instant of contact, an emotion of joy ...
— Popular Education - For the use of Parents and Teachers, and for Young Persons of Both Sexes • Ira Mayhew

... a defeat; but Pelle had learned something, none the less! The victory was to the strong, and their organization was not as yet sufficient. They must talk and agitate, and hold meetings! The tendency to embrace the new ideas certainly inclined the men to organize themselves, but their sense of honor was as yet undeveloped. ...
— Pelle the Conqueror, Complete • Martin Andersen Nexo

... money, and nearly to ruin herself. In consequence she was obliged for a time to take up her abode with Honore, an arrangement which did not work well. Even when Henry was at last shipped off to the Indies, he continued to agitate his family by sending them pathetic accounts of his distress and necessities, and these letters from her much-loved son must have been peculiarly painful ...
— Honore de Balzac, His Life and Writings • Mary F. Sandars

... methods of anti-war times had been renewed. President Johnson had differed with his party as to the best method of reconstructing the State governments of the South, which had been destroyed and impoverished by the war, and the press began to agitate the question of the next President. Of course, all Union men naturally turned to General Grant, and the result was jealousy of him by the personal friends of President Johnson and some of his cabinet. Mr. Johnson ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman

... which it would have been entitled on the basis of numbers. But the French Canadians were content to abide by the compact, and on that score there was peace. As soon, however, as {55} the influx of settlers into Upper Canada turned the scale, the Globe began to agitate for a revision of the agreement. In the session of 1853 Brown condemned the system of equal representation, and moved that the representation of the people in parliament should be based upon population, without regard to any line of separation between Upper and Lower Canada. On this ...
— The Day of Sir John Macdonald - A Chronicle of the First Prime Minister of the Dominion • Joseph Pope

... ours, Had manifold necessities prepared, Not without thought or labor satisfied; So that the days, though ever sad, less dull Might seem unto the human family; And this desire, bewildered and confused, Might have less power to agitate the heart. So, too, the various families of brutes, Who have, no less than we, and vainly, too, Desire for happiness; but they, intent On that which is essential to their life, Consume their days more pleasantly, by far, Nor chide, with us, the dulness ...
— The Poems of Giacomo Leopardi • Giacomo Leopardi

... who have been inoculated with the fallacious doctrine of "the class war" and who have accepted the philosophy that progress consists in fomenting discord in industry ("When you get your $12 a day, don't stop at that. Agitate for $14. When you get your eight hours a day, don't be a fool and grow contented; agitate for six hours. Start something! Always start something!"), have the plain sense which enables them to recognize that with principles accepted and observed, conditions ...
— My Life and Work • Henry Ford

... city. During his exile Cicero's manliness to some extent deserted him. He drifted from place to place, seeking the protection of officials against assassination, writing letters urging his supporters to agitate for his recall, sometimes accusing them of lukewarmness and even treachery, bemoaning the ingratitude of his' country or regretting the course of action that had led to his outlawry, and suffering from extreme depression over his separation from his wife and children and the wreck ...
— Treatises on Friendship and Old Age • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... Redistribution, why agitate for Woman's Suffrage, if trifles like these are to obstruct a girl's path ...
— Much Darker Days • Andrew Lang (AKA A. Huge Longway)

... have set before myself is to give a clear presentation of an important type of Christian life and thought, in the hope that it may suggest to us a way towards the solution of some difficulties which at present agitate and divide us. The path is beset with pitfalls on either side, as will be abundantly clear when we consider the startling expressions which Mysticism has often found for itself. But though I have not attempted to give even an outline ...
— Christian Mysticism • William Ralph Inge

... door; one was a short, stout snob, with great red whiskers, the other a wiry gentleman with iron-grey hair. The latter spoke to Alfred, and began to coax him. If Mrs. Archbold was honey, this personage was treacle. "Be calm, my dear young gentleman; don't agitate yourself. You have been sent here for your good; and that you may be cured, and so restored to society and to your anxious and ...
— Hard Cash • Charles Reade

... conclude too hastily, however, that faction did not, in a certain degree, agitate the particular cities; much less that a due subordination and harmony reigned in the general system. The contrary is sufficiently displayed in the vicissitudes and ...
— The Federalist Papers • Alexander Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison

... Doctor Lingard took me back to the night of the burglary. I wondered if to tell Miss Emily would unduly agitate her. I think I would not have told her, but I caught the girl's eye, across the bed, raised from her knitting and fixed on me with a peculiar intensity. Suddenly it seemed to me that Miss Emily was surrounded by a conspiracy of silence, ...
— The Confession • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... if any complication should arise in the meantime, you will of course telephone me. She is suffering now from shock, it seems, combined with the after-effects of morphia. Later when she is less exhausted she may be intensely nervous. One must see that she is kept absolutely quiet, with nothing to agitate her. A fresh shock might do ...
— Juggernaut • Alice Campbell

... benumbed us, while we dragged ourselves through the softened plains which evening was darkening. At one halt I saw one of those men who used to agitate at the depot to be sent to the front. He had sunk down at the foot of the stacked rifles; exertion had made him almost unrecognizable, and he told me that he had had enough of war! And little Melusson, whom I once used ...
— Light • Henri Barbusse

... country; to her husband an heir of his name; to herself a protector. And yet the contrast of all these fine titles with this being, so humble, soon strikes her. At the aspect of this frail treasure, opposite feelings agitate her heart; she seems to recognise in him a nature superior to her own, but subjected to a low condition, and she honors a future greatness in the object of extreme compassion. Somewhat of that respect and adoration for a feeble child, of which some fine ...
— Woman in the Ninteenth Century - and Kindred Papers Relating to the Sphere, Condition - and Duties, of Woman. • Margaret Fuller Ossoli

... any interest in it, though I knew that it was concerning a tract of ground in the city which had belonged to my grandfather, and which had, since his day, become very valuable. Litigation was a habit of the Huell family. So the sight of the Uxbridge family did not agitate me as it did ...
— Lemorne Versus Huell • Elizabeth Drew Stoddard

... at being a political study. I would attempt to exemplify the influence of individual humors and passions—some of them among the highest, and others certainly the basest that agitate humanity—upon the march of great events, upon general historical results at certain epochs, and upon ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)

... proceeds from very different sources. Vanity could not bring the tears into my eyes as they have been brought by the kindness of my countrymen. I have felt cast down, blighted, and broken-spirited, and these sudden rays of sunshine agitate me more than they revive me. I hope—I hope I may yet do something more worthy of the appreciation ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner

... living—since the errors of progenitors have not instructed their descendants, the ancient examples are about to reappear; the earth will see renewed the tremendous scenes it has forgotten. New revolutions will agitate nations and empires; powerful thrones will again be overturned, and terrible catastrophes will again teach mankind that the laws of nature and the precepts of wisdom and truth cannot ...
— The Ruins • C. F. [Constantin Francois de] Volney

... just a moment; then said, steadily, 'He is coming here, because you are his wife—because he is faithful to you—because he wants you. Don't agitate him too much! He wants resting and healing. And so do you!' She took Phoebe's hands again in hers. 'And how do you think anybody is to deny you anything, when you bring such ...
— Fenwick's Career • Mrs. Humphry Ward

... all, Mrs. Martin. You are doing your child harm, and you ought to desist. If you continue to agitate him in this way the consequences will ...
— The Faith Doctor - A Story of New York • Edward Eggleston

... the progressive expansion of the company's business would be to that extent checked. On the other hand, there is a contrary argument that as long as the company has a large reserve fund there is a possibility that dissatisfied shareholders may agitate for a realisation of sufficient assets to enable that reserve fund to be distributed, especially if it has been wholly acquired out of past profits. In this case the capitalisation of the reserve fund puts this ...
— War-Time Financial Problems • Hartley Withers

... primitive courtship—where there is any at all—is habitually a "simple and speedy affair"—not always as simple and speedy as with Nansen's Greenlanders, but too much so to allow of the growth and play of those mixed emotions which agitate modern swains. Fancy the difference between the African of Yariba who, as Lander tells us (I., 161), "thinks as little of taking a wife as of cutting an ear of corn," and the modern lover who suffers the tortures of the inferno because a certain girl frowns on ...
— Primitive Love and Love-Stories • Henry Theophilus Finck

... distinguished success: besides the devastation of their lands, this additional blow also befell the Sabines. Fabius was sent to Algidum as successor to Minucius. Toward the end of the year the tribunes began to agitate concerning the law; but, because two armies were away, the patricians carried their point, that no proposal should be made before the people. The commons succeeded in electing the same tribunes for the fifth time. It ...
— Roman History, Books I-III • Titus Livius

... said the man in black; "the power of that name suddenly came over Europe, like the power of a mighty wind; it was said to have come from Judea, and from Judea it probably came when it first began to agitate minds in these parts; but it seems to have been known in the remote East, more or less, for thousands of years previously. It filled people's minds with madness; it was followed by books which were never much regarded, as they contained little of insanity; ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow

... the dark eye, and her lips moved themselves wildly; but no one was there to refresh with friendly hand the dry lips and the hot brow; no cooling fever-draught stood near her bed. Two new-born babes lay weeping near the mother. Uneasy phantoms seemed to agitate the unhappy one: sometimes she raised herself in the bed with wild gestures, but sunk back again powerless; whilst her pale, convulsed, and wandering lips spoke from the depths of her torn heart the following ...
— The Home • Fredrika Bremer

... the most suggestive books: it is better, in general, to hear what is already known, and may be simply said. Much of the literature of the present day, though good to be read by persons of ripe age, has a tendency to agitate rather than confirm, and leaves its readers too frequently in a helpless or hopeless indignation, the worst possible state into which the mind of youth can be thrown. It may, indeed, become necessary for you, as you advance in life, to set your hand to things that need to be altered in the ...
— The Crown of Wild Olive • John Ruskin

... am a near-city-dweller. For ten months in the year, I am particular about mail-delivery, and eat an evening dinner, and occasionally agitate the matter of having a telephone in every room in the house. I run the usual gamut of dinners, dances, and bridge, with the usual country-club setting as the spring goes on. And each May I order a number of flimsy ...
— Tenting To-night - A Chronicle of Sport and Adventure in Glacier Park and the - Cascade Mountains • Mary Roberts Rinehart

... untainted by the crimes and artificial manners which destroy its purity, is a beautiful thing to contemplate among the virtuous poor; and, where the current of affection runs deep and smooth, the slightest incident will agitate it. So it was with Owen M'Carthy and his wife. Simplicity, truth, and affection, constituted their character. In them there was no complication of incongruous elements. The order of their virtues was not broken, nor the purity of their affections violated, by the anomalous blending together ...
— Phelim O'toole's Courtship and Other Stories • William Carleton

... entered into the conspiracy of the Duke d'Orleans and Cinq Mars, and, arrested, thrown into chains at Pierre-Encise, he had only saved his head from the scaffold by abandoning his principality. Ever since, he had not ceased to agitate for the recovery of that which by treason he had lost. He had again demanded Sedan from Mazarin in 1643, and not being able to obtain it at the hands of that great servant of the Crown, that, in order to satisfy a private interest, ...
— Political Women, Vol. 2 (of 2) • Sutherland Menzies

... have come to a fixed opinion that the plan of the first describer's name, being appended for perpetuity to a species, had been the greatest curse to Natural History. Some months since, I wrote out the enclosed badly drawn- up paper, thinking that perhaps I would agitate the subject; but the fit has passed, and I do not suppose I ever shall; I send it you for the CHANCE of your caring to see my notions. I have been surprised to find in conversation that several naturalists were of nearly my way of thinking. I feel ...
— The Life and Letters of Charles Darwin, Volume I • Francis Darwin

... whose features he had instantly identified with an image once most dear to him; but which had, long since, been absorbed in the pursuits of interest, and the struggles of ambition. The time had indeed gone by, when associations, blended with that image, could deeply agitate him; and, connected as they were, with his aversion to D'Aulney, they tended to excite emotions of ...
— The Rivals of Acadia - An Old Story of the New World • Harriet Vaughan Cheney

... September 11.—Imbeciles agitate the question of mediation. European cabinets will not offer it now, and nobody, not even the rebels, would accept. No possible terms and basis exist for any mediation. A Solomon could not find them out. If Jackson and ...
— Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862 • Adam Gurowski

... been," the count went on, studying the ash of his cigar, "till this night what the world and my own conscience consider an honorable man. I have never wronged a man or woman personally. What I have done on the order of duty does not agitate my conscience. I am simply a machine. The moral responsibility rests with my czar. When I saw your daughter, I deeply regretted that ...
— The Man on the Box • Harold MacGrath

... The words Puwa-i'a na hoa makani, which literally mean that the congress of winds, na hoa makani, have stirred up a commotion, even as a school of fish agitate the surface, of the ocean, puwa-i'a, refer to the ...
— Unwritten Literature of Hawaii - The Sacred Songs of the Hula • Nathaniel Bright Emerson

... "Why will you agitate her, Mrs. Ormond, in this manner?" said Mr. Hervey, with an expression of sudden anger. It was succeeded by a look of such tender compassion for Virginia, that Mrs. Ormond rejoiced to have excited his anger; at any price she wished to serve her ...
— Tales and Novels, Vol. III - Belinda • Maria Edgeworth

... doctor would not allow the sleep of his patient to be disturbed. It was really a long stupor, broken only by an occasional murmur of pain that continued to disquiet and agitate the ...
— Five Weeks in a Balloon • Jules Verne

... swear to agitate against all forms of undue and excessive taxation, which, while scarcely affecting the rich, make life more difficult and ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli

... to—where did you say you had left it—Wandsworth?—by yourself! I really couldn't think of it. I don't want to be unnecessarily hard—but I really couldn't—no mother could. I must consider the interests of my child. But I don't want you to agitate yourself, and if you like I'll write myself to the woman who has charge of your baby. I cannot do more, and ...
— Esther Waters • George Moore

... pride desire better for you, than the establishment which will one day be mine? Come then, Alice, and since you condemn me to banishment—since you deny me a share in those stirring achievements which are about to agitate England—come! do you—for you only can—do you reconcile me to exile and inaction, and give happiness to one, who, for your sake, is willing ...
— Peveril of the Peak • Sir Walter Scott

... which added to my bitterness and melancholy. The decks were cleared—the guns cast loose, and every man stood in eager expectation at his quarters. It is an awful moment, lady, and various conflicting emotions agitate the breast when, in the calm stillness that reigns fore and aft, the mind looks back upon the past, and contemplates the future. Home, wife, children, and every tender remembrance rush upon the soul. It is different in the heat of action: then every faculty is ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction - Volume 10, No. 272, Saturday, September 8, 1827 • Various

... such circumstances, as strong evidence of the accuracy of its statements. The preface to the English edition, too, was not adapted to this country, having been written, as it would seem, in reference to the political questions which agitate Great Britain. The publishers, therefore, applied to the writer of this, to furnish them with a short preface, and such notes upon the text as might appear necessary to correct any erroneous impressions. Having had the honor of a personal acquaintance with M. DE ...
— American Institutions and Their Influence • Alexis de Tocqueville et al

... assured Hilda that he was still in an encouraging condition, and told her that she herself must keep calm, so that her recovery might be more rapid. For several days he forbade a renewal of the subject of conversation, with the intention, as he said, of sparing her every thing which might agitate her. Whether his precautions were wise or not may be doubted. Hilda sometimes troubled herself with fancies that the doctor might, perhaps, suspect all the truth; and though she succeeded in dismissing the idea as absurd, yet the trouble which she experienced ...
— The Cryptogram - A Novel • James De Mille

... began to agitate the country, toward the close of the year 1860, Mr. Eads cast the weight of his private and public influence on the side of the Union. He felt that the war, if it should come, would be a very serious affair for the West, as the prosperity of that section depends largely upon ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.

... had failed: but now a stronger and more tactful grasp was to succeed in a feat which naturally became easier every year that removed the passions of the revolutionary epoch further into the distance. Men cannot for ever perorate, and agitate and plot. A time infallibly comes when an able leader can successfully appeal to their saner instincts: and that hour had now struck. Bonaparte's appeal was made to the many, who cared not for politics, ...
— The Life of Napoleon I (Volumes, 1 and 2) • John Holland Rose

... among those who lived by its innocent arts. Still, the holidays were near, and hope revived. If revolutionized Paris would not buy as the jour de l'an approached, Paris must have a new dynasty. The police foresaw this, and it ceased to agitate, in order to bring the republicans into discredit; men must eat, and trade was permitted to revive a little. Alas! how little do they who vote, know WHY they vote, or they who dye their hands in the blood of their kind, why the deed ...
— Autobiography of a Pocket-Hankerchief • James Fenimore Cooper

... Sardinian government in 1831 and expelled from Italy; organised at Marseilles the secret society of Young Italy, whose motto was "God and the People"; driven from Marseilles to Switzerland and from Switzerland to London, he never ceased to agitate and conspire for this object; on the outbreak of the Revolution in 1848 at Paris he hastened thither to join the movement, which had spread into Italy, and where in 1849 he was installed one of a triumvirate in Rome and conducted the defence of the city against the arms of France, but refusing to ...
— The Nuttall Encyclopaedia - Being a Concise and Comprehensive Dictionary of General Knowledge • Edited by Rev. James Wood

... wife, "and so increasing the circle of our present trade, don't ye understand?"—for another, he was as keen as the keenest that the railway should come and enhance the value of his property. "We must agitate," he cried, when Sandy Toddle murmured a doubt whether anything they could do would be of much avail. "It's not settled yet what road the line's to follow, and who knows but a trifle may turn the scale in our behalf? Local opinion ought to be expressed! They're sending a monster petition ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown

... step, it had appeared to him, would dissolve the spell of his embarrassment; in act, he found it otherwise: he found himself no less incapable of speech or further progress; and with the lady's hand in his, sat helpless. But worse was in store. A peculiar quivering began to agitate the form of his companion; the hand that lay unresistingly in Somerset's trembled as with ague; and presently there broke forth, in the shadow of the carriage, the bubbling and musical sound of laughter, resisted but triumphant. ...
— The Dynamiter • Robert Louis Stevenson and Fanny van de Grift Stevenson

... public policy. We originated, to put it in the vernacular, in a kick, and if it be unpatriotic to kick, why then the grown man is unlike the child. We have forgotten the very principle of our origin if we have forgotten how to object, how to resist, how to agitate, how to pull down and build up, even to the extent of revolutionary practices, if it be necessary to readjust matters. I have forgotten my history, if that be not ...
— Jailed for Freedom • Doris Stevens

... a molehill mountain. You shouldn't let a thing like this agitate your noble nerves. Bless the dear little woman. I'll run on to Common Garden, Central Avenue, as we say in some suckles, bully the beggar for not sending it, start him, and be back ...
— Witness to the Deed • George Manville Fenn

... "hereafter," it was evident that there was a strong under-current of desire for its introduction into the State. Some of the leading politicians, exaggerating the extent of this desire, imagined they saw in it a means of personal advancement, and began to agitate the question of a convention to amend the Constitution. At that time there was a considerable emigration setting through the State from Kentucky and Tennessee to Missouri. Day by day the teams of the movers passed through the Illinois settlements, and wherever they halted for rest and refreshment ...
— Abraham Lincoln: A History V1 • John G. Nicolay and John Hay

... forth Miss Carlyle, for the topic was sure to agitate her, "that Jezebel of brass did presume to come here! She chose her time well, and may thank her lucky stars I was not at home. Archibald, he's a fool too, quite as bad a you are, Dick Hare, in some things—actually suffered her to lodge here for two days! A vain, ill-conducted hussy, given ...
— East Lynne • Mrs. Henry Wood

... slumbering charms, that all her soul betray. Then, as coy fears th' admiring gaze upbraid, Starts;—and these lines, with hurried pen pourtray'd, Slides in his half-clos'd hand;—and speeds away.— "Ye eyes, ye human stars!—if, thus conceal'd By Sleep's soft veil, ye agitate my heart, Ah! what had been its conflict if reveal'd Your rays had shone!"—Bright Nymph, thy strains impart Hopes, that impel the graceful Bard to rove, Seeking thro' Tuscan ...
— Original sonnets on various subjects; and odes paraphrased from Horace • Anna Seward

... other hand, in 1947 citizen groups sprang up in Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Ohio, and California to agitate among their state adjutants general for liberalization of the National Guard's racial policy. As early as February 1947 Governor James L. McConnaughy had publicly deplored segregation of Negroes in his own Connecticut National ...
— Integration of the Armed Forces, 1940-1965 • Morris J. MacGregor Jr.

... income of Great Britain, and the manner in which it is at present distributed. Labour was represented as getting less than one-fourth of the whole, and the labourers were informed that if they would but "educate themselves, agitate, and organise," the remaining three-fourths would automatically pass into their possession. This document, it is true, was issued some twenty years ago;[4] but that the form which socialism takes, when addressed to the masses of the population, has not appreciably altered ...
— A Critical Examination of Socialism • William Hurrell Mallock

... Mrs. Clayton has told me, I had supposed that my disinterested care and assiduity with regard to your condition were about to meet their reward in your rational submission to the necessities of your case and mine. Resume your seat, I entreat you, and let us calmly discuss a matter that seems to agitate you so unduly. Perhaps I may be able to place it before you in a better light ere we have concluded our interview. You will sit down again, ...
— Miriam Monfort - A Novel • Catherine A. Warfield



Words linked to "Agitate" :   concuss, provoke, displace, convulse, succuss, tremble, thresh about, calm, poke, quake, rile, beat, plump up, pother, sparge, thrash about, stimulate, thrash, promote, thresh, fan, agitator, bother, rumpus, jiggle, commove, hype up, stir up, trouble, upset, agitative, move, rattle, advertize, excite, electrify, advertise, scramble, turn on, joggle, toss, roil, wiggle, palpitate, disturb, tremor, raise up, psych up, fluff up, push, jactitate, slash



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