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Disable   /dɪsˈeɪbəl/   Listen
Disable

verb
(past & past part. disabled; pres. part. disabling)
1.
Make unable to perform a certain action.  Synonyms: disenable, incapacitate.
2.
Injure permanently.  Synonyms: handicap, incapacitate, invalid.



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"Disable" Quotes from Famous Books



... lost on account of no greater thing than a loose saddle-girth. A loose screw will disable the mightiest engine in the world. A bit of sand in the bearing of an axle has brought many a locomotive to a standstill, and thrown out of order every train on the division. Lives have been lost, business houses wrecked, private fortunes laid in the balance, just because some one did ...
— Stories Worth Rereading • Various

... has its part in every pitched battle, and in the intervals it has many severe conflicts of its own. Daring, ambitious leaders are coming to the front, and the year will be one of great and hazardous activity. My chief regret is that Hilland's wound did not disable him wholly from further service in the field. Still he will come out all right. He always has and ever will. There are hidden laws that control and shape our lives. It seems to me that you were predestined ...
— His Sombre Rivals • E. P. Roe

... is that of John Blair Linn, brother-in-law of Charles Brockden Brown, who was not out of love with his nativity, nor accustomed to disable the benefits of his country. In his "Powers of Genius," which was beautifully reprinted in ...
— The Philadelphia Magazines and their Contributors 1741-1850 • Albert Smyth

... surgeon who made an examination reported that he discovered indications that the claimant had suffered at some time with chronic ophthalmia, but that in his opinion his eyes did not disable him in the least, and that the claimant was well nourished ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents - Section 3 (of 3) of Volume 8: Grover Cleveland, First Term. • Grover Cleveland

... came a lull. The captain said thoughtfully, "Those are the waves that disable or founder ships and send them to the bottom of ...
— The Land of the Long Night • Paul du Chaillu

... a valiant soldier, and Slasher is my name, With sword and buckler by my side, I hope to win more fame; And for to fight with me I see thou art not able, So with my trusty broadsword I soon will thee disable. ...
— The Peace Egg and Other tales • Juliana Horatia Ewing

... shells fired at our guns gradually cut away the top of our work, until it was so low that it did not sufficiently protect our gun. We feared that some of the shells would strike our gun, and disable it. To avert this, for many hours that day, from time to time, we had to take turns, and, with shovels, throw sand from the inside on the top of the work. In this way we managed to keep our defences up, but it was weary work, and we grew very tired. Still, there was nothing ...
— From the Rapidan to Richmond and the Spottsylvania Campaign - A Sketch in Personal Narration of the Scenes a Soldier Saw • William Meade Dame

... Canada, personal combat is not hampered by rules. The main thing is to disable one's antagonist as quickly as possible, and Festing knew that Wilkinson would not be scrupulous. He must not be beaten, particularly since his defeat would, to some extent, ...
— The Girl From Keller's - Sadie's Conquest • Harold Bindloss

... you traveled at forty-five. Would it disable you permanently, or would you recover as soon as ...
— Spacehounds of IPC • Edward Elmer Smith

... bade the men row across the current until they should reach the ship (of Giermund). She took a gimlet out of the boat's locker, and gave it to one of her companions, and bade him go to the cockle-boat belonging to the merchant ship and bore a hole in it so as to disable it if they needed it in a hurry. Then she had herself put ashore with the little maid still in her arms. This was at the hour of sunrise. She went across the gangway into the ship, where all men were asleep. She went to the hammock where Giermund slept. His sword Footbiter hung on a peg ...
— Laxdaela Saga - Translated from the Icelandic • Anonymous

... conducted this enterprise, the capture of this important place is to be ascribed. The naval armaments of Britain had intercepted the reinforcements designed by France for her colonies; and the pressure on Canada was such as to disable the governor of that province from detaching troops to fort Du Quesne. Without the aid of these causes, the extraordinary and unaccountable delays of the campaign ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 2 (of 5) • John Marshall

... week or more. The alternative was an escalade, in which the undisciplined assailants would no doubt have met a bloody rebuff. Thus this Grand Battery, which, says Wolcott, "is in fact a fort," might at least have been held long enough to save the munitions and stores, and effectually disable the cannon, which supplied the English with the only artillery they had, competent to the work before them. The hasty abandonment of this important post was not Duchambon's only blunder, but it was the ...
— A Half-Century of Conflict, Volume II • Francis Parkman

... him the next afternoon teaching two new men the use and abuse of a tractor, and plainly bored by his task. Sharon seized the moment to talk pungently about the good old times when a farm hand didn't have to know how to disable a tractor, or anything much, and would work fourteen hours a day for thirty dollars a month and his keep. He named the wage of the two pupils in a tone of disgruntled awe that piqued them pleasantly but did not ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson

... make these sacrifices with a disinterested view to the service of my country. I am ready to go still further; and the United States may command everything I have, except my integrity, and the loss of that would effectually disable me from serving them more. What I have to pray, then, is, that the adjustment of all past transactions, and of all that relates to the present system, may be completed by the means already adopted, that whatever remains unpaid may become a funded debt, and that it may in that ...
— The Diplomatic Correspondence of the American Revolution, Vol. XI • Various

... will (notwithstanding) examine the art of God in creating the world; of God, who (saith Job) "is so excellent as we know him not"; and examine the beginning of the work, which had end before mankind had a beginning of being. He will disable God's power to make a world, without matter to make it of. He will rather give the motes of the air for a cause; cast the work on necessity or chance; bestow the honor thereof on nature; make two powers, the one to be the ...
— Prefaces and Prologues to Famous Books - with Introductions, Notes and Illustrations • Charles W. Eliot

... back began to ache. Silvey owned a discolored spot over one eye where an opponent had tried to disable him during a tense moment of the game. John's shin was badly bruised, and Perry Alford had wrenched his ankle. The other members had minor hurts. Only Red Brown had, by some miracle, come ...
— A Son of the City - A Story of Boy Life • Herman Gastrell Seely

... power to obey, God has not lost the power to command. Dr. Thomas Reid meets this notion thus: "Suppose a man employed in the navy of his country, and, longing for the ease of a public hospital as an invalid, to cut off his fingers so as to disable him from doing the duty of a sailor; he is guilty of a great crime, but after he has been punished according to the demerit of his crime, will his captain insist that he shall do the duty of a sailor? Will he command him to go aloft when it is impossible for him to do it, and ...
— The Doctrines of Predestination, Reprobation, and Election • Robert Wallace

... spotted; we're going to open up on her," the voice from the Gaucho announced. "She has two 90's to our one; we'll try to disable them, first." The vision-screen lit with the indirect glare of the gun-flash, and the image in it jiggled violently as the ship shook to the recoil, then steadied again, with the enemy ship visible in the middle of it, growing larger and larger as the Gaucho rushed toward ...
— Uller Uprising • Henry Beam Piper, John D. Clark and John F. Carr

... thrown by the boy, struck the creature on the wing, but the blow did not disable it, and the jacamar ran off and ...
— The Mysterious Island • Jules Verne

... seen the shot, and with La Salle rushed forward to note its effect, although neither hoped for more than a wound whose bleeding would ultimately disable him, when patient tracking would secure his much-prized fur. As they ran to the fence they noted the deeply-cut scores in the icy crust which marked the first dropping shot, and Peter became loud in ...
— Adrift in the Ice-Fields • Charles W. Hall

... Lieutenant Warneford released his first bomb when about 1,000 feet above the Zeppelin. He saw it strike the airbag and disappear, followed by a puff of smoke. Because of the sectional arrangement this did not disable the airship. The Lieutenant circled off and again approached the Zeppelin. Every gun was trained upon him that could be brought to bear. The wings of his machine were shattered many times, but he kept on fighting. When once more above the ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume IV (of 8) • Francis J. (Francis Joseph) Reynolds, Allen L. (Allen Leon)

... understand," he said, in a low tone. "I did not mean to put this thing upon you. I meant, perhaps, to disable that man who has just left. If you knew his history and mine, you would not wonder at it. But I meant to see that he ...
— The Lost Ambassador - The Search For The Missing Delora • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... would say one of the most able, if not the most able they have; but Lord Melbourne is told by others, who know Lord Fitzgerald better, that Lord Melbourne overrates him. He is a very good speaker, he has not naturally much industry, and his health is bad, which will probably disable him from a very close and assiduous attention to business. It is, however, upon the whole an adequate appointment, and he is perhaps more likely to go on smoothly with the Court of Directors, which is a great matter, ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Volume 1 (of 3), 1837-1843) • Queen Victoria

... and just as many clever people, who look upon customs of society as on laws of nature, and judge the worth of others by their knowledge or ignorance of the same. So doing they disable themselves from understanding the essential, which is, like love, the fulfilling of the law. A certain Englishman gave great offence in an Arab tent by striding across the food placed for the company on the ground: would any Celt, Irish or Welsh, have been guilty ...
— What's Mine's Mine • George MacDonald

... (and to compel any succeeding Base Runners to hold their bases), but also to impose a heavy fine upon him. For example: If the Base Runner plainly strike at the ball while passing him, to prevent its being caught by a Fielder; if he holds a Fielder's arms so as to disable him from catching the ball, or if he run against or knock the Fielder ...
— Spalding's Baseball Guide and Official League Book for 1889 • edited by Henry Chadwick

... in chase and runs so hard that he runs the boy down a dozen times, but each time he repeats the curve, the duck, the dive, and scours away again. To strike at him on any of these occasions would be to fell and disable him, but the pursuer cannot resolve to do that, and so the grimly ridiculous pursuit continues. At last the fugitive, hard-pressed, takes to a narrow passage and a court which has no thoroughfare. Here, against a hoarding of decaying timber, he ...
— Bleak House • Charles Dickens

... impossible as seemed her escape, that the sole chance for the life of Glaucus rested on her, this young girl, frail, passionate, and acutely susceptible as she was—resolved not to give way to a despair that would disable her from seizing whatever opportunity might occur. She kept her senses whenever, beneath the whirl of intolerable thought, they reeled and tottered; nay, she took food and wine that she might sustain her ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton

... terrible force against the stern or side of the vessel selected for attack. One blow from the long lance- like point, propelled by the whole weight and impetus of the trireme, was sufficient to sink or disable an enemy's ship, and the attacking galley was then backed away from the wreck, and ...
— Stories From Thucydides • H. L. Havell

... increased in fury and was now blowing half a gale. The sail threatened to split into ribbons, and the gunwale was constantly under water as the Ariel plunged along. Lester's muscles were strained to the utmost to hold the rudder against the heavy waves that seemed bound to disable it. ...
— The Rushton Boys at Treasure Cove - Or, The Missing Chest of Gold • Spencer Davenport

... got a very bad cough, for an Austen; but it does not disable him from making very nice fringe for the ...
— Jane Austen, Her Life and Letters - A Family Record • William Austen-Leigh and Richard Arthur Austen-Leigh

... professor of psychiatry, Columbia University, writing in his book, The Person in the Body, (W. W. Norton & Co.) states, "In some persons the fear of disease is often the only damaging evidence of disease, yet it can be so strong as to disable the person in all his daily activities." The entire field of psychosomatic medicine, which deals with the interrelationship between body and mind, has as one of its basic tenets that suggestion not only can cause psychological personality disorders, ...
— A Practical Guide to Self-Hypnosis • Melvin Powers

... is to be a very large meeting at Kennington on Monday, and Alfred Potocki said he would take me to it, but as I have to act that night I am afraid it would be hardly conscientious to run the risk of an accidental blow from a brickbat that might disable me for my work, which is my duty, though, I confess, it is a great temptation. My friend, Comte Potocki, is young and tall and strong and active, but I would a great deal rather have paid a policeman to ...
— Records of Later Life • Frances Anne Kemble

... bayonets fixed. Here, however, they met with no resistance: the enemy had abandoned the fort with precipitation. The British colours were immediately hoisted, and sentinels of marines posted upon the parapet. The next care was to spike and disable the cannon, break the carriages, and destroy the powder which they found in the magazine: nevertheless, the detachment was ordered to keep possession of the battery. This service being successfully performed, ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett

... his honor if he can possibly help it. Don't you think, Rodman," he added kindly, turning to the lad, "that the more manly course would have been to have stayed in Euston until you had solved the problem of who really did disable ...
— Cab and Caboose - The Story of a Railroad Boy • Kirk Munroe

... iron plating. At a critical moment in the fight the "Merrimac" ran aground; and the "Monitor" steamed around her several times, seeking for weak places in which to plant a shot Once Worden dashed at his adversary's screw, hoping to disable it, but missed by perhaps two feet. Two shots from the "Monitor" struck the muzzles of two cannon protruding from the portholes of the "Merrimac," and broke them off, throwing huge splinters of iron among the gunners inside. And so the battle continued until about noon: gun ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot

... to leave it behind me unattacked. I believe no one will wish their interpretation of that act to be considered as authentic. What shall we think of the wisdom (to say nothing of the competence) of that legislature which should ordain to itself such a fundamental law, at its outset, as to disable itself from executing its own functions,—which should prevent it from making any further laws, however wanted, and that, too, on the most interesting subject that belongs to human society, and where she most frequently wants its interposition,—which should fix ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... herself recklessly in front of Patiomkin as he starts in pursuit of the Chamberlain]. Kick me. Disable me. It will be an excuse for not going back to her. Kick ...
— Great Catherine • George Bernard Shaw

... by no means idle; and the position occupied by Hooker, in most of its details, was familiar to the Southern commander. He was thus able to develop his plans with greater ease than a less familiarity with the terrain would have yielded. He was satisfied that one more vigorous blow would disable his antagonist for this campaign, and he was unwilling to delay in ...
— The Campaign of Chancellorsville • Theodore A. Dodge

... aboard, and a lighter ship to work, Captain Byron at 2 P. M. was near enough to exchange bow—and stern-chasers with the Constitution, out of range however. Hull expected to be overtaken, and made every arrangement to try in such case to disable the first frigate before her consorts could close. But neither the Belvidera nor the Shannon dared to tow very near for fear of having their boats sunk by ...
— The Naval War of 1812 • Theodore Roosevelt

... balls stood (fig. 41). The whole assembly was bagged in cloth and reinforced with a net of heavy cord. In later years grape was made by bagging two or three tiers of balls, each tier separated by an iron disk. Grape could disable men at almost 900 yards and was much used during the 1700's. Eventually, it was almost replaced by case shot, which was more effective at shorter ranges (400 to 700 yards). Incidentally, there were 2,000 sacks of grape at the Castillo in 1740, more ...
— Artillery Through the Ages - A Short Illustrated History of Cannon, Emphasizing Types Used in America • Albert Manucy

... Italy, we travellers shall be made sport of in comedies." Twenty years afterwards, Shakespeare makes Rosalind say in "As You Like It", "Farewell, Monsieur Traveller. Look you; lisp, and wear strange suits. Disable all the benefits of your own country. Be out of love with your nativity, and almost chide God for making you that countenance you are, or I will scarce think you ...
— Literary and Social Essays • George William Curtis

... the south country in our rear, our right extending to the town, our left to Sillery, and halted a few moments. The general then detached the light troops to our left to rout the enemy from their battery, and to disable their guns, except they should be rendered serviceable to the party who were to remain there; and this service was soon performed. We then faced to the right and marched towards the town by files, till we came to the Plains ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine

... been better policy to attribute only to the unfortunate circumstances of the times. No consideration can ever make me cease to regret the memory of Ney, who was the victim of the influence of foreigners. Their object, as Blucher intimated to me at St. Cloud, was to disable France from engaging in war for a long time to come, and they hoped to effect that object by stirring up between the Royal Government and the army of the Loire that spirit of discord which the sacrifice of Ney could not fail to produce. I have no positive proofs of the fact, ...
— Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte, Complete • Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne

... born in the Year [1680. [1]] What I desire of you is, That you disallow that a Coxcomb who pretends to write Verse, should put the most malicious Thing he can say in Prose. This I humbly conceive will disable our Country Wits, who indeed take a great deal of Pains to say any thing in Rhyme, tho they say it very ill. I am, SIR, Your ...
— The Spectator, Volume 2. • Addison and Steele

... Hillsborough word. It means to disable a man from work. Sometimes they lie in wait in these dark streets, and fracture his skull with life-preservers; or break his arm, or cut the sinew of his wrist; and that they call DOING him. Or, if it is a grinder, they'll put powder in his trough, and then the ...
— Put Yourself in His Place • Charles Reade

... possible unless the mouth is shut; and, therefore, as we might suffocate a man by keeping his mouth shut, so we should suffocate a frog by keeping his mouth open. Yet we should not suffocate him instantly; we should disable the lungs; but, in this class of animals the whole skin is a breathing surface. A frog has lived a month after his lungs had been extracted. All respiratory surfaces, like the inside of our own lungs, can act only when they are relaxed and moist. That is the reason why a frog's skin is always ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various

... occurred to me that a bullet, if fired at a foe in the dark, would be very unlikely to hit; I, therefore, drew both charges, and loaded with buckshot instead. You see, thought I, there is no absolute necessity to kill any one. All I can possibly wish to do is to disable, and big shot is more likely to do that without killing, ...
— The Big Otter • R.M. Ballantyne

... friends: Enraghty little and fierce and restless, Hingston large and kind and calm. What they joined in saying prevailed in questions of public interest; those who yielded to their wisdom liked to believe that Enraghty's opinion ruled with Hingston. Matthew Braile alone had the courage to disable their judgment which he liked to say was no more infallible than so much Scripture, but the hardy infidel, who knew so much law and was inexpugnable in his office, owned that he could not make head against their ...
— The Leatherwood God • William Dean Howells

... and finely engraved. The edge is kept very sharp. The blow of this dangerous weapon is generally enough to kill a man. I was informed that a Morro never struck his enemy but two blows with his bolo, one on each side; if that did not disable him the Morro would ...
— A Soldier in the Philippines • Needom N. Freeman

... loan, and volunteer Bills might be passed, which would put Mr. Lincoln in immediate condition for hostilities; whereas, by remaining in our places until the 4th of March, it is thought we can keep the hands of Mr. Buchanan tied, and disable the Republicans from effecting any legislation which will strengthen the hands ...
— The Great Conspiracy, Complete • John Alexander Logan

... weapon, as the English soldier the bayonet. Their superior tactic is to surprise the enemy, especially in the night, when the Genii help them, and hack him to pieces. The spear is used mostly to wound and disable the camel. Their manner of disposing of the booty, is characteristic. "What are we to do with these women and children?" they asked me, "when we have exterminated the Shânbah men." Without waiting for a reply they said:—"Oh, we'll send them to the Turks and sell them." They have the example ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson

... disable an enemy's ship by wounding his masts, yards, and steerage gear, thereby placing him ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth

... to the Resolution in the course of the voyage, so as to disable her from proceeding any farther, you are, in such case, to remove yourself and her crew into the Discovery, and to prosecute your voyage in her; her commander being hereby strictly required to receive ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 15 (of 18) • Robert Kerr

... to the left hand may disable the horseman, we would recommend the newly-invented piece of armour called the gauntlet, which protects the shoulder, arm, and elbow, with the hand engaged in holding the reins, being so constructed ...
— On Horsemanship • Xenophon

... is also unable to kill a giraffe in most cases; for if the giraffe sees the lion coming, it will kick out with its hind legs or its fore legs; and a kick from a giraffe has been known to disable a lion completely. So if a lion by himself wants to attack a giraffe, he must first stalk the giraffe stealthily, and then jump on ...
— The Wonders of the Jungle, Book Two • Prince Sarath Ghosh

... R., a middle aged man, mechanic, was sent by Dr. ARCULARIUS Nov. 9th, 1874. Had post-rheumatic sciatica of some six weeks' standing. There were no remarkable features about the case, which however was sufficiently severe to disable him from pursuing his avocation. He took his first bath on the date above-mentioned. Another bath was administered next day, and three more every alternate day. He was then almost well. On Nov. 25th he returned, there remaining ...
— The Electric Bath • George M. Schweig

... fort of Ormuz was building, or rather finishing, Albuquerque persuaded the king that it would contribute to the safety of the city to put all their cannon into the fort to defend them against their enemies, but in reality to disable them from resisting the Portuguese domination. Security is a powerful argument with those who are in fear, so that the king and his governor reluctantly consented to this demand. Thus the rich and powerful kingdom of Ormuz was completely subjected ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Volume VI - Early English Voyages Of Discovery To America • Robert Kerr

... with a malicious grin, "if thou art so sure of the effectiveness of the weapon, let me see thee use it in a real fight. Mapela, give 'Mfuni thy spear. And, hark ye, 'Mfuni, if thou canst slay the white man, or even disable him, thou shalt choose twenty head of cattle from mine own herd, and they shall be thine. But if the white man proves to be the victor in the fight, and there is still life in thee when it is over, I swear, by the bones of my royal father, that thou shalt ...
— Through Veld and Forest - An African Story • Harry Collingwood

... but this is no murder case now. On the face of it Nat did not set out to murder his father; he did not set out really to sink your schooner—merely to disable it; the proof is indisputable and self-evident by his own confession ...
— The Harbor of Doubt • Frank Williams

... impracticable, I saw no other alternative but to rest as content as possible and return to Tooboui, and there wait till the masts of the Bounty should be taken out, and then take the boat which might carry me to Taheite, and disable those remaining from pursuit.[20] But Providence so ordered it, that we had no occasion to try our fortune at such a hazard, for, upon returning there and remaining till the latter end of August, in which time a fort was almost built, but nothing could be effected; and as the natives could ...
— The Eventful History Of The Mutiny And Piratical Seizure - Of H.M.S. Bounty: Its Cause And Consequences • Sir John Barrow

... could they have, Ned?" "They might have hoped to disable you, or some of your machines, so that you couldn't compete with them. They're unscrupulous, I hear, and will do anything to succeed and make money. So be on your guard ...
— Tom Swift and his Air Scout - or, Uncle Sam's Mastery of the Sky • Victor Appleton

... Juan this act was not final. The noose enraged him, but did not frighten or disable him. As the great bear of the foothills, when roped by the horseman, scorns to attempt escape, but pulls man and horse toward him by main force, so the giant savage who was now thus assailed put forth his strength, and by sheer power of ...
— The Girl at the Halfway House • Emerson Hough

... creature-comforts, and a covenant with Christ, go hand in hand together, Isa. lv. 2, 3. Nahash would not make a covenant with the men of Jabesh-Gilead, unless they would pluck out their right eyes, intending (as Josephus gives the reason) to disable them from fighting or making war; for the buckler or shield did cover their left eye when they fought, so that they had been hard put to it, to fight without the right eye. This was a cruel mercy in him; but it is a merciful severity in Christ, that he will make ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie

... it, unless by a country (such as India) which offered not merely more than seventeen, but more than twenty bushels of wheat for ten cwts. of iron. Short of that, the competition would only oblige the United States to pay dearer for iron, but would not disable her from exporting wheat. The country, therefore, which could undersell the United States, must, in the first place, be able to produce wheat at less cost, compared with iron, than the United States herself; and, in the ...
— Principles Of Political Economy • John Stuart Mill

... soon afterwards; Ensign Gregorson, Ensign McKenzie and Lieutenant Alexander Fraser, all slightly. I received a contusion in the right shoulder or rather breast, before the action became general, which pained me a good deal, but it did not disable me from my duty then, ...
— A Canadian Manor and Its Seigneurs - The Story of a Hundred Years, 1761-1861 • George M. Wrong

... under him; but alas! it left a seed of evil in the wresting of Alsace-Lorraine from France. For France never forgave this. Bismarck and Moltke knew she would not forgive, and were sorely tempted to engineer a second war which should utterly disable her; but this war never came off. The seed of Revenge, however, remained with France, and the seed of Fear with Germany; and these two things were destined to lead to a ...
— The Healing of Nations and the Hidden Sources of Their Strife • Edward Carpenter

... entry of this bill in Cobbett's "Parliamentary History" is: "The House of Commons testified a very extraordinary zeal in unravelling the Popish Plot, and, to prevent mischief in the interval, passed a bill to disable Papists from sitting in either House of Parliament," to which the Lords, when the bill came up to their House, added a proviso exempting the Duke of York from its operation. An. 1678; October 26 to ...
— The Constitutional History of England From 1760 to 1860 • Charles Duke Yonge

... qualitie in it. Thirdly, is it not the greatest sinne of all, that you the people of all sortes of this Kingdome, who are created and ordeined by God to bestowe both your persons and goods for the maintenance both of the honour and safetie of your King and Commonwealth, should disable yourselves in both? In your persons hauing by this continuall vile custome brought yourselues to this shameful imbecilitie, that you are not able to ride or walke the journey of a Jewes Sabboth, but you must haue a reekie cole brought you from the next poore house to ...
— A Counter-Blaste to Tobacco • King James I.

... usually had a cold, or a cough, or something to disable me; and I never had any talent for housework. If I swept and sanded the floor, polished the samovar, and ran errands, I was doing much. I minded the baby, who did not need much minding. I was willing enough, I suppose, but the hard things were done ...
— The Promised Land • Mary Antin

... so the Grecians boasted that they were either Autocthones, that is earthbredde, or els lineally descended from the Gods. And the Romans affirme that Mars was father vnto their first founder Romulus. Right well therefore and iudicially sayth Titus Liuius: Neither meane I to auouch (quoth he) ne to disable or confute those thinges which before the building and foundation of the Citie haue beene reported, being more adorned and fraught with Poeticall fables then with incorrupt and sacred monuments of trueth: ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, • Richard Hakluyt

... filled the kingdom, sometimes with the roar of empty menace, and sometimes with the yell of hypocritical lamentation. Every man saw, and every honest man saw with detestation, that they who desired to force their sovereign into war, endeavoured, at the same time, to disable ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson, Vol. 6 - Reviews, Political Tracts, and Lives of Eminent Persons • Samuel Johnson

... little as if intoxicated, and then sink helplessly to the bottom, where, the water being nowhere very deep, it was easy to see them and capture them. The natives secured basket after basket full, getting some so large that they could not carry them in their baskets. These they would disable with a "machete" and then tow ashore. The fish did not eat the "macasla." It seemed simply to have impregnated the water, making a solution too powerful for them to withstand. They were not killed by its effects, but acted as if they were drunk. Those which the natives did not capture ...
— Anting-Anting Stories - And other Strange Tales of the Filipinos • Sargent Kayme

... soldier relies mainly on fire action to disable the enemy, but he should know that personal combat is often necessary to obtain success. Therefore, he must be instructed in the use of the rifle and bayonet in ...
— Manual for Noncommissioned Officers and Privates of Infantry • War Department

... River. In going down to the well Richards fell down among the reeds, and a splinter entered his wrist, passing under the skin for one and a half inches; but no material injury has occurred, though the wound will disable him ...
— Journals of Australian Explorations • A C and F T Gregory

... commanded the colonel, going forward and covering the man with the gun, while Rand took the helm. "If you make any attempt to use that pistol I will disable you at once." ...
— The Boy Scouts Patrol • Ralph Victor

... forced the Negro down, who, unable to regain his feet, finally, whether from fear or exhaustion, lay inert, until the constable, having worked off his worst anger, and not deeming it to his advantage seriously to disable the prisoner, in whom he had a pecuniary ...
— The Colonel's Dream • Charles W. Chesnutt

... could prevail upon myself to settle down to some mode of making a livelihood; and I was about to engage in business as a vender of lottery policies, when I first began to feel a strange sense of lassitude, which soon increased so as quite to disable me from work of any kind. Month after month passed away, while my money lessened, and this terrible sense of weariness still went on from bad to worse. At last one day, after nearly a year had elapsed, I perceived on my face a large brown patch of color, in consequence ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 121, November, 1867 • Various

... Mounsieur Trauellor: looke you lispe, and weare strange suites; disable all the benefits of your owne Countrie: be out of loue with your natiuitie, and almost chide God for making you that countenance you are; or I will scarce thinke you haue swam in a Gundello. Why how now Orlando, where haue you bin all ...
— The First Folio [35 Plays] • William Shakespeare

... born again into the world. Such, for instance, was obviously the intention of the old English custom of burying a suicide at a cross-road with a stake driven through his body. And if some burial customs are plainly intended to pin down the dead in the earth, or at least to disable him from revisiting the survivors, so others appear to be planned with the opposite intention of facilitating the departure of the spirit from the grave, in order that he may repair to a more commodious lodging or be born again into the tribe. For ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer

... both attacked the English frigate, and she had made a feint of flight and then turned on them and managed to sink one and disable the other. She would have to wait for repairs. So much the good landlady had told before her lodger could ask a question, and when she paused for breath he inquired whether she knew the name of the English ship. Certainly, the Mermaid ...
— Two Maiden Aunts • Mary H. Debenham

... subordination upon esteem. Without this, all schemes are begun at the wrong end. All who join in them are liable to their consequences. All men who, under whatever pretext, take a part in the formation or the support of systems constructed in such a manner as must, in their nature, disable them from the execution of their duty, have made themselves guilty of all the present distraction, and of the future ruin, which they ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. I. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... come down the stream floating on the surface of the water in a natural and easy way; if a fish rises and does not swallow it, do not pull your fly away, the odds are he will follow and take it, his motive I suppose in the first instance being to disable; however when Trout are fairly glutted with the May-fly, they may rise, but will not even touch it. When a fish has seized your fly, do not strike too hard or hastily, numbers of fish are lost by doing so, let them always turn their heads ...
— The Teesdale Angler • R Lakeland

... exploited and oppressed, it is the ghost of unemployment, the whip of hunger, which compels them to it. If, on the other hand, the worker is secure in his existence, even when not in work, then nothing is easier to him than to disable the capitalist. He no longer requires the capitalist, while the latter cannot conduct his business without him. When the matter has gone so far as that every employer, whenever a dispute breaks out, will get the worst of it and be forced to yield, ...
— British Socialism - An Examination of Its Doctrines, Policy, Aims and Practical Proposals • J. Ellis Barker

... was not lucky for me. I missed my antagonist, and received his bullet in my left shoulder; this did not, however, disable me, and I said nothing about it. The pistols were again loaded and handed to us; and on the signal being given, my adversary's pistol went off a little before the word "fire" was given, and I felt myself again hit; but ...
— Percival Keene • Frederick Marryat

... household are, the more creditable and more effective for the purpose of reputability of the household or its head will their life be. So much so that the women have been required not only to afford evidence of a life of leisure, but even to disable themselves for ...
— The Theory of the Leisure Class • Thorstein Veblen

... the wall and distributing the material. It was found impracticable to move the chute readily enough to permit of feeding the concrete directly into place. As the concreting progressed upward the trestle was extended and the chute shortened. It was found that wear would soon disable a steel chute so that the main trussed cylinder had a smaller, cheaply made cylinder placed inside as a lining to take the wear ...
— Concrete Construction - Methods and Costs • Halbert P. Gillette

... enemies whom they had any cause to fear, but it would also bring back the Hittite kings to their allegiance, and restore the Assyrian supremacy over the wealthiest regions of Western Asia: they would thus disable Urartu and reconquer Syria at one and the same time. Tiglath-pileser, therefore, crossed the Euphrates in the spring of 743 B.C., neither Matilu of Agusi, Kushtashpi of Kummukh, nor their allies daring to interfere with his progress. He thus advanced as far as Arpad, and, in the first ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 7 (of 12) • G. Maspero

... power, must necessarily have in weakening the mercantile capital, and disabling the merchants from all undertakings of magnitude, is but too visible. However, a witness of understanding and credit does not believe the capitals of the natives to be yet so reduced as to disable them from partaking in the trade, if they were otherwise able to put themselves on an ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VIII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... was walking as sentry, guarding the prisoners he had SURROUNDED, all by himself. I halted the sentinel, received the swords from the commissioned officers, and proceeded, with the assistance of the soldiers now with me, to disable the muskets by striking them against the edge of the wall, and throw them to the ...
— Memoirs of Three Civil War Generals, Complete • U. S. Grant, W. T. Sherman, P. H. Sheridan

... remaining leech. A horrible suspicion possessed me that the little brute was dead. He remained at any rate completely torpid, though I coaxed him almost in agony to show some sign of life. Obviously the bottle contained nothing to nourish him; to offer him my own blood would be to disable him for another patient. On the fourth afternoon I went so far as to try him on the back of my hand. I waited five minutes; he gave no sign. Then, startled by a footstep outside, I popped him hurriedly back in ...
— The Laird's Luck • Arthur Quiller-Couch

... shattered health. We hold it, therefore, a point of that grateful duty we owe to your Majesty's goodness and graciousness, to make this melancholy statement at once, rather than to stay till absolute incapacity might disable me from offering one small but sincere tribute of profound respect to your Majesty,—the only one in my power—that of continuing the high honour of attending your Majesty, till your Majesty's own choice, time, and convenience nominate a ...
— The Diary and Letters of Madam D'Arblay Volume 2 • Madame D'Arblay

... you lisp, and wear strange suits; disable all the benefits of your own country; be out of love with your nativity, and almost chide God for making you that countenance you are; or I will scarce think you have swam ...
— Characteristics of Women - Moral, Poetical, and Historical • Anna Jameson

... mansion wearing much the appearance of a recently besieged fortress. How many of the Klan had lost their lives it was impossible to tell, but probably only a small number, as the aim of the party of defense had been, by mutual agreement, to disable and not to slay; but it was thought the assailants had suffered a sufficiently severe punishment to deter them from a renewal of the attack. Also Mr. Lilburn's pursuit keeping up the delusion that troops were at hand, had greatly frightened ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley

... fortunately but a slight one, does not disable him; and, like a tiger stung by javelins, he is round in an instant, ready to return ...
— The Death Shot - A Story Retold • Mayne Reid

... intended only to disable the horse—he was a good enough shot to do that without endangering his rider. But as Pearson stooped the ball went through his shoulder and then through Road Runner's neck. The horse fell and the cowman pitched over his head into the hard road, and neither of them ...
— Waifs and Strays - Part 1 • O. Henry

... at the enemy. Pot-shots up and down the valleys were unsatisfactory, and the bayonet never seemed to get a chance. Perhaps it was as well, for a long-limbed Afghan with a knife had a reach of eight feet, and could carry away enough lead to disable three Englishmen, The Fore and Fit would like some rifle-practice at the enemy—all seven hundred rifles blazing together. That wish showed ...
— Indian Tales • Rudyard Kipling

... sayd, I saw her there, I knew her well I know God will require her blood at my hands if I should testifie falsly. Allso bec he sd he saw her kittle, there being at so great a distance, they doubted that these things did not only weaken & blemish his testimony, but also in a great measure disable it for ...
— The Witchcraft Delusion In Colonial Connecticut (1647-1697) • John M. Taylor

... influence by ministers. The king was waiting for an opportunity to get rid of the coalition ministry, and Thurlow and Temple easily excited his jealousy for the prerogative by telling him that the bill would deprive him of half his power and disable him for the rest of his life. His influence in the commons was diminished by recent legislation, and there the bill was carried by two to one. Before the second reading in the lords he gave Temple a card authorising ...
— The Political History of England - Vol. X. • William Hunt

... Friend,—I am aware that I should have written to you before, but the cold weather is apt to disable me and to make me feel idle when it does not do so quite. Now I am going to write about your ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1 of 2) • Frederic G. Kenyon

... more after each time he had wrestled and rolled about. Then Belllounds, getting this position, lay with his weight upon Moore, holding him down, and at the same time kicking with all his might. He was aiming to disable the cowboy by kicking the injured foot. And he was succeeding. Moore let out a strangled cry, and struggled desperately. But he was held and weighted down. Belllounds raised up now and, looking backward, he deliberately and furiously ...
— The Mysterious Rider • Zane Grey

... devastations among them are often very extensive. On account of this, efforts are constantly made to destroy him. He is hunted with dogs, which run him to bay, or force him to seek safety in a tree, where he is kept till the approach of the hunters, who shoot him, or disable him ...
— Fun And Frolic • Various

... by February 10th. General Banks will feign on Pascagoula and General Logan on Rome. I want you with your cavalry to move from Colliersville on Pontotoc and Okolona; thence sweeping down near the Mobile & Ohio Railroad, disable that road as much as possible, consume or destroy the resources of the enemy along that road, break up the connection with Columbus, Mississippi, and finally reach me at or near Meridian as near the date I have mentioned as possible. This will call for great energy of action ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman

... gun requires more care. There is a weight of 20,000 lbs. moving on friction Rollers along a metal plate, down an inclined plane—if once permitted to get loose and to be propelled by the motion of the ship, the momentum is immense, and must disable some of the apparatus, perhaps the Gun-Carriage itself. On such an occasion the preventer breeching is invaluable, and will be the best safeguard, if fitted so that when well stretched it will not permit the fore trucks to ascend on the curve of the ...
— Ordnance Instructions for the United States Navy. - 1866. Fourth edition. • Bureau of Ordnance, USN

... this. And in considering how best to prevent such inhuman heroisms, we were reminded of another frequent incident in our battles that also erred towards the incredible and vitiated our strategy. That was the charging of one or two isolated horse-men at a gun in order to disable it. Let me illustrate this by an incident. A force consisting of ten infantry and five cavalry with a gun are retreating across an exposed space, and a gun with thirty men, cavalry and infantry, in support comes out upon a ...
— Little Wars; a game for boys from twelve years of age to one hundred and fifty and for that more intelligent sort of girl who likes boys' games and books • H. G. Wells

... leaders resorted to the methods usual in all such cases, of intimidation and actual violence. Workmen at Anzin who had taken 'marchandages' were attacked and beaten, some of them so severely as to disable them ...
— France and the Republic - A Record of Things Seen and Learned in the French Provinces - During the 'Centennial' Year 1889 • William Henry Hurlbert

... desperate by the shadow of coming events, this man, so the officials say, issued a circular advising old employees to return to work and when out on the road to disable and destroy the company's locomotives, abandoning them where they were wrecked and ruined. The man accused of this crime declared that the circular was a forgery, committed by his secretary, who was a detective. But that the circular went out properly signed and sealed ...
— Snow on the Headlight - A Story of the Great Burlington Strike • Cy Warman

... dominion of Spain, have not undergone any material change within the past year. The incessant sanguinary conflicts in or between those countries are to be greatly deplored as necessarily tending to disable them from performing their duty as members of the community of nations and rising to the destiny which the position and natural resources of many of them might lead them justly to anticipate, as constantly giving occasion also, directly or indirectly, ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... Aramis, "remember that he goes in an opposite direction from that in which we are going, that he has a fresh horse, and ours are fatigued, so that we shall disable our own horses without even a chance of overtaking him. Let the man go, d'Artagnan; ...
— The Three Musketeers • Alexandre Dumas, Pere



Words linked to "Disable" :   incapacitate, disenable, handicap, restrain, hold, pinion, nobble, disablement, invalid, wound, change, lay up, injure, enable, confine, modify, hock, alter



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