Quotes: V

Vacancy

All dispositions to idleness or vacancy, even before they are habits, are dangerous.

How is't with you, That you do bend your eye on vacancy?

Time lost partly in too oft idle vacancies given both to schools and universities.

No interim, not a minute's vacancy.

Those little vacancies from toil are sweet.

Vacant

Stuffs out his vacant garments with his form.

Being of those virtues vacant.

There is no fireside, howsoe'er defended, But has one vacant chair.

Religion is the interest of all; but philosophy of those . . . at leisure, and vacant from the affairs of the world.

There was not a minute of the day which he left vacant.

Special dignities which vacant lie For thy best use and wearing.

The duke had a pleasant and vacant face.

When on my couch I lie In vacant or in pensive mood.

Vacate

That after act vacating the authority of the precedent.

The necessity of observing the Jewish Sabbath was vacated by the apostolical institution of the Lord's Day.

He vacates my revenge.

Vacation

It was not in his nature, however, at least till years had chastened it, to take any vacation from controversy.

Vacillate

[A spheroid] is always liable to shift and vacillatefrom one axis to another.

Vacillation

His vacillations, always exhibited most pitiably in emergencies.

There is a vacillation, or an alternation of knowledge and doubt.

Vacuity

Hunger is such a state of vacuity as to require a fresh supply of aliment.

A vacuity is interspersed among the particles of matter.

God . . . alone can answer all our longings and fill every vacuity of our soul.

Their expectations will meet with vacuity.

Vacuous

Boundless the deep, because I am who fill Infinitude; nor vacuous the space.

That the few may lead selfish and vacuous days.

Vade

They into dust shall vade.

Vagabond

To heaven their prayers Flew up, nor missed the way, by envious winds Blown vagabond or frustrate.

A fugitive and a vagabond shalt thou be.

On every part my vagabonding sight Did cast, and drown mine eyes in sweet delight.

Vagancy

A thousand vagancies of glory and delight.

Vagary

They changed their minds, Flew off, and into strange vagaries fell.

Vagrancy

Threatened away into banishment and vagrancy.

Vagrant

That beauteous Emma vagrant courses took.

While leading this vagrant and miserable life, Johnson fell in love.

Vagrants and outlaws shall offend thy view.

Vague

She danced along with vague, regardless eyes.

This faith is neither a mere fantasy of future glory, nor a vague ebullition of feeling.

The poet turned away, and gave himself up to a sort of vague revery, which he called thought.

Some legend strange and vague.

The gray vague of unsympathizing sea.

Vaguely

What he vaguely hinted at, but dared not speak.

Vail

My house is as 'twere the cave where the young outlaw hoards the stolen vails of his occupation.

Vail your regard Upon a wronged, I would fain have said, a maid!

France must vail her lofty-plumed crest!

Without vailing his bonnet or testifying any reverence for the alleged sanctity of the relic.

Thy convenience must vail to thy neighbor's necessity.

Vain

Every man walketh in a vain show.

Let no man deceive you with vain words.

Vain pomp, and glory of this world, I hate ye!

Vain wisdom all, and false philosophy.

Bring no more vain oblations.

Vain is the force of man To crush the pillars which the pile sustain.

But wilt thou know, O vain man, that faith apart from works is barren?

The minstrels played on every side, Vain of their art.

Load some vain church with old theatric state.

Vainglory

He had nothing of vainglory.

The man's undone forever; for if Hector break not his neck i' the combat, he'll break't himself in vainglory.

Vair

No vair or ermine decked his garment.

Valance

Valance of Venice gold in needlework.

His old fringed chair valanced around with party-colored worsted bobs.

Vale

Beyond this vale of tears there is a life above.

In those fair vales, by nature formed to please.

Valetudinarian

My feeble health and valetudinarian stomach.

The virtue which the world wants is a healthful virtue, not a valetudinarian virtue.

Valetudinarians must live where they can command and scold.

Valetudinary

It renders the habit of society dangerously valetudinary.

Valiant

A valiant and most expert gentleman.

And Saul said to David . . . be thou valiant for me, and fight the Lord's battles.

[The saints] have made such valiant confessions.

Valid

An answer that is open to no valid exception.

Validate

The chamber of deputies . . . refusing to validate at once the election of an official candidate.

Valley

The valley of the shadow of death.

Sweet interchange Of hill and valley, rivers, woods, and plains.

Valor

For contemplation he and valor formed.

When valor preys on reason, It eats the sword it fights with.

Fear to do base, unworthy things is valor.

Valuable

The food and valuables they offer to the gods.

Valuation

Since of your lives you set So slight a valuation.

Value

Ye are all physicians of no value.

Ye are of more value than many sparrows.

Caesar is well acquainted with your virtue, And therefore sets this value on your life.

Before events shall have decided on the value of the measures.

An article may be possessed of the highest degree of utility, or power to minister to our wants and enjoyments, and may be universally made use of, without possessing exchangeable value.

Value is the power to command commodities generally.

Value is the generic term which expresses power in exchange.

His design was not to pay him the value of his pictures, because they were above any price.

My relation to the person was so near, and my value for him so great

The mind doth value every moment.

The queen is valued thirty thousand strong.

The king must take it ill, That he's so slightly valued in his messenger.

Neither of them valued their promises according to rules of honor or integrity.

Which of the dukes he values most.

Some value themselves to their country by jealousies of the crown.

The peace between the French and us not values The cost that did conclude it.

Valve

Swift through the valves the visionary fair Repassed.

Heavily closed, . . . the valves of the barn doors.

Vamp

I had never much hopes of your vamped play.

Vampire

The persons who turn vampires are generally wizards, witches, suicides, and persons who have come to a violent end, or have been cursed by their parents or by the church,

Van

Standards and gonfalons, twixt van and rear, Stream in the air.

He wheeled in air, and stretched his vans in vain; His vans no longer could his flight sustain.

Vandal

The Vandals of our isle, Sworn foes to sense and law.

Vane

Aye undiscreet, and changing as a vane.

Vanish

The horse vanished . . . out of sight.

Go; vanish into air; away!

The champions vanished from their posts with the speed of lightning.

Gliding from the twilight past to vanish among realities.

Vanity

Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher, vanity of vanities; all is vanity.

Here I may well show the vanity of that which is reported in the story of Walsingham.

The exquisitely sensitive vanity of Garrick was galled.

Vanity of vanities, saith the Preacher.

Vanity possesseth many who are desirous to know the certainty of things to come.

[Sin] with vanity had filled the works of men.

Think not, when woman's transient breath is fled, That all her vanities at once are dead; Succeeding vanities she still regards.

You . . . take vanity the puppet's part.

Vanquish

They . . . vanquished the rebels in all encounters.

This bold assertion has been fully vanquished in a late reply to the Bishop of Meaux's treatise.

For e'en though vanquished, he could argue still.

Vantage

O happy vantage of a kneeling knee!

It is these things that give him his actual standing, and it is from this vantage ground that he looks around him.

Vap

In vain it is to wash a goblet, if you mean to put into it nothing but the dead lees and vap of wine.

Vapid

A cheap, bloodless reformation, a guiltless liberty, appear flat and vapid to their taste.

Vapor

Vapor is any substance in the gaseous condition at the maximum of density consistent with that condition. This is the strict and proper meaning of the word vapor.

The vapour which that fro the earth glood [glided].

Fire and hail; snow and vapors; stormy wind fulfilling his word.

For what is your life? It is even a vapor, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away.

Running waters vapor not so much as standing waters.

Poets used to vapor much after this manner.

We vapor and say, By this time Matthews has beaten them.

He'd laugh to see one throw his heart away, Another, sighing, vapor forth his soul.

Vaporish

Pallas grew vap'rish once and odd.

Vaporous

The warmer and more vaporous air of the valleys.

The food which is most vaporous and perspirable is the most easily digested.

Such vaporous speculations were inevitable.

Vare

His hand a vare of justice did uphold.

Variable

Lest that thy love prove likewise variable.

His heart, I know, how variable and vain!

Variance

That which is the strength of their amity shall prove the immediate author of their variance.

Variant

He is so variant, he abit [abides] nowhere.

Variation

The essences of things are conceived not capable of any such variation.

Varied

The varied fields of science, ever new.

Variegate

The shells are filled with a white spar, which variegates and adds to the beauty of the stone.

Variegated

Ladies like variegated tulips show.

Varier

Pious variers from the church.

Varietal

Perplexed in determining what differences to consider as specific, and what as varietal.

Variety

Variety is nothing else but a continued novelty.

The variety of colors depends upon the composition of light.

For earth hath this variety from heaven.

There is a variety in the tempers of good men.

He . . . wants more time to do that variety of good which his soul thirsts after.

All sorts are here that all the earth yields! Variety without end.

But see in all corporeal nature's scene, What changes, what diversities, have been!

Various

So many and so various laws are given.

A wit as various, gay, grave, sage, or wild.

A man so various, that he seemed to be Not one, but all mankind's epitome.

The names of mixed modes . . . are very various.

A happy rural seat of various view.

Varlet

What a brazen-faced varlet art thou !

Varletry

Shall they hoist me up, And show me to the shouting varletry Of censuring Rome.

Varnish

The varnish of the holly and ivy.

And set a double varnish on the fame The Frenchman gave you.

Close ambition, varnished o'er with zeal.

Cato's voice was ne'er employed To clear the guilty and to varnish crimes.

Vary

Shall we vary our device at will, Even as new occasion appears?

Gods, that never change their state, Vary oft their love and hate.

We are to vary the customs according to the time and country where the scene of action lies.

God hath varied their inclinations.

God hath here Varied his bounty so with new delights.

That each from other differs, first confess; Next, that he varies from himself no less.

While fear and anger, with alternate grace, Pant in her breast, and vary in her face.

The rich jewel which we vary for.

Vase

No chargers then were wrought in burnished gold, Nor silver vases took the forming mold.

Vassal

The sun and every vassal star.

Vast

The empty, vast, and wandering air.

Through the vast and boundless deep.

Michael bid sound The archangel trumpet. Through the vast of heaven It sounded.

Vastity

The huge vastity of the world.

Vasty

I can call spirits from the vasty deep.

Vat

Let him produce his vats and tubs, in opposition to heaps of arms and standards.

Vaticination

It is not a false utterance; it is a true, though an impetuous, vaticination.

Vaudeville

The early vaudeville, which is the forerunner of the opera bouffe, was light, graceful, and piquant.

Vault

The long-drawn aisle and fretted vault.

The silent vaults of death.

To banish rats that haunt our vault.

That heaven's vault should crack.

The shady arch that vaulted the broad green alley.

I will vault credit, and affect high pleasures.

Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself.

Leaning on his lance, he vaulted on a tree.

Lucan vaulted upon Pegasus with all the heat and intrepidity of youth.

Vaunt

Pride, which prompts a man to vaunt and overvalue what he is, does incline him to disvalue what he has.

Charity vaunteth not itself, is not puffed up.

My vanquisher, spoiled of his vaunted spoil.

The spirits beneath, whom I seduced With other promises and other vaunts.

And what so else his person most may vaunt.

Vavasor

Vavasours subdivide again to vassals, exchanging land and cattle, human or otherwise, against fealty.

Vaward

Since we have the vaward of the day.

Veer

And as he leads, the following navy veers.

an ordinary community which is hostile or friendly as passion or as interest may veer about.

Veery

Sometimes I hear the veery's clarion.

Vegetable

Blooming ambrosial fruit Of vegetable gold.

Vegetal

All creatures vegetal, sensible, and rational.

Vegetate

See dying vegetables life sustain, See life dissolving vegetate again.

Persons who . . . would have vegetated stupidly in the places where fortune had fixed them.

Vegete

Even her body was made airy and vegete.

Vegetive

The blest infusions That dwell in vegetives, in metals, stones.

Vehemence

I . . . tremble at his vehemence of temper.

Vehemency

The vehemency of your affection.

Vehicle

A simple style forms the best vehicle of thought to a popular assembly.

Veil

The veil of the temple was rent in twain.

She, as a veil down to the slender waist, Her unadornéd golden tresses wore.

[I will] pluck the borrowed veil of modesty from the so seeming Mistress Page.

Her face was veiled; yet to my fancied sight, Love, sweetness, goodness, in her person shined.

To keep your great pretenses veiled.

Vein

Let the glass of the prisms be free from veins.

He can open a vein of true and noble thinking.

Certain discoursing wits which are of the same veins.

Invoke the Muses, and improve my vein.

Veinous

The excellent old gentleman's nails are long and leaden, and his hands lean and veinous.

Velitation

After a short velitation we parted.

Vellicate

Convulsions, arising from something vellicating a nerve in its extremity, are not very dangerous.

Venal

The venal cry and prepared vote of a passive senate.

Thus needy wits a vile revenue made, And verse became a mercenary trade.

This verse be thine, my friend, nor thou refuse This, from no venal or ungrateful muse.

Venality

Complaints of Roman venality became louder.

Vendible

The regulating of prices of things vendible.

Veneer

As a rogue in grain Veneered with sanctimonious theory.

Venerable

He was a man of eternal self-sacrifice, and that is always venerable.

Venerable men! you have come down to us from a former generation.

Venerate

And seemed to venerate the sacred shade.

I do not know a man more to be venerated for uprightness of heart and loftiness of genius.

Veneration

We find a secret awe and veneration for one who moves about us in a regular and illustrious course of virtue.

Venereal

Into the snare I fell Of fair, fallacious looks, venereal trains, Softened with pleasure and voluptuous life.

Venery

Contentment, without the pleasure of lawful venery, is continence; of unlawful, chastity.

I love hunting and venery.

Veney

Three veneys for a dish of stewed prunes.

Vengeance

To me belongeth vengeance and recompense.

To execute fierce vengeance on his foes.

Venial

So they do nothing, 't is a venial slip.

Venom

Or hurtful worm with cankered venom bites.

Vent

There is no vent for any commodity but of wool.

Therefore did those nations vent such spice.

Look, how thy wounds do bleed at many vents.

Long 't was doubtful, both so closely pent, Which first should issue from the narrow vent.

Without the vent of words.

Thou didst make tolerable vent of thy travel.

The queen of heaven did thus her fury vent.

By mixing somewhat true to vent more lies.

Thou hast framed and vented very curious orations.

Ventail

Her ventail up so high that he descried Her goodly visage and her beauty's pride.

Ventilate

Macaulay took occasion to ventilate one of those startling, but not very profound, paradoxes.

Ventilation

Insuring, for the laboring man, better ventilation.

The ventilation of these points diffused them to the knowledge of the world.

Ventricle

Whether I will or not, while I live, my heart beats, and my ventricle digests what is in it.

These [ideas] are begot on the ventricle of memory.

Venture

I, in this venture, double gains pursue.

My ventures are not in one bottom trusted.

A certain man drew a bow at a venture.

A bargain at a venture made.

Who freights a ship to venture on the seas.

I am afraid; and yet I'll venture it.

A man would be well enough pleased to buy silks of one whom he would not venture to feel his pulse.

Venturous

This said, he paused not, but with venturous arm He plucked, he tasted.

Venue

The twelve men who are to try the cause must be of the same venue where the demand is made.

Veracious

The Spirit is most perfectly and absolutely veracious.

The young, ardent soul that enters on this world with heroic purpose, with veracious insight, will find it a mad one.

Veranda

The house was of adobe, low, with a wide veranda on the three sides of the inner court.

Verbal

Made she no verbal question?

We subjoin an engraving . . . which will give the reader a far better notion of the structure than any verbal description could convey to the mind.

And loses, though but verbal, his reward.

Mere verbal refinements, instead of substantial knowledge.

Verbarian

Southey gives himself free scope as a verbarian.

Verbiage

Verbiage may indicate observation, but not thinking.

This barren verbiage current among men.

Verbose

Too verbose in their way of speaking.

Verbosity

The worst fault, by far, is the extreme diffuseness and verbosity of his style.

Verdant

Let the earth Put forth the verdant grass.

Verdict

These were enormities condemned by the most natural verdict of common humanity.

Two generations have since confirmed the verdict which was pronounced on that night.

Verdure

A wide expanse of living verdure, cultivated gardens, shady groves, fertile cornfields, flowed round it like a sea.

Verge

Even though we go to the extreme verge of possibility to invent a supposition favorable to it, the theory . . . implies an absurdity.

But on the horizon's verge descried, Hangs, touched with light, one snowy sail.

The inclusive verge Of golden metal that must round my brow.

Our soul, from original instinct, vergeth towards him as its center.

I find myself verging to that period of life which is to be labor and sorrow.

Verify

This is verified by a number of examples.

So shalt thou best fulfill, best verify. The prophets old, who sung thy endless reign.

To verify our title with their lives.

Verily

Trust in the Lord and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed.

Verisimilitude

Verisimilitude and opinion are an easy purchase; but true knowledge is dear and difficult.

All that gives verisimilitude to a narrative.

Verisimility

The verisimility or probable truth.

Verity

It is a proposition of eternal verity, that none can govern while he is despised.

Mark what I say, which you shall find By every syllable a faithful verity.

Vermeil

In her cheeks the vermeill red did show Like roses in a bed of lilies shed.

Vermin

Wherein were all manner of fourfooted beasts of the earth, and vermin, and worms, and fowls.

This crocodile is a mischievous fourfooted beast, a dangerous vermin, used to both elements.

Great injuries these vermin, mice and rats, do in the field.

They disdain such vermin when the mighty boar of the forest . . . is before them.

You are my prisoners, base vermin.

Verminous

Some . . . verminous disposition of the body.

Vernacular

His skill in the vernacular dialect of the Celtic tongue.

Which in our vernacular idiom may be thus interpreted.

vernal

And purple all the ground with vernal flowers.

When after the long vernal day of life.

And seems it hard thy vernal years Few vernal joys can show?

Vernicle

A vernicle had he sowed upon his cap.

Vernile

The example . . . of vernile scurrility.

Versant

Men not versant with courts of justice.

Versatile

Conspicuous among the youths of high promise . . . was the quick and versatile [Charles] Montagu.

Verse

Such prompt eloquence Flowed from their lips in prose or numerous verse.

Virtue was taught in verse.

Verse embalms virtue.

Playing on pipes of corn and versing love.

It is not rhyming and versing that maketh a poet.

Versed

Deep versed in books and shallow in himself.

Opinions . . . derived from studying the Scriptures, wherein he was versed beyond any person of his age.

These men were versed in the details of business.

Versicle

The psalms were in number fifteen, . . . being digested into versicles.

Versify

I'll versify in spite, and do my best.

I'll versify the truth, not poetize.

Version

The version of air into water.

Vertical

Charity . . . is the vertical top of all religion.

Verticality

The different points of the verticality.

Verticity

I hardly believe he hath from elder times unknown the verticity of the loadstone.

Vertiginous

Some vertiginous whirl of fortune.

They [the angels] grew vertiginous, and fell from the battlements of heaven.

Very

Whether thou be my very son Esau or not.

He that covereth a transgression seeketh love; but he that repeateth a matter separateth very friends.

The very essence of truth is plainness and brightness.

I looked on the consideration of public service or public ornament to be real and very justice.

Vespillo

Like vespilloes or grave makers.

Vessel

[They drank] out of these noble vessels.

[He] began to build a vessel of huge bulk.

He is a chosen vessel unto me.

[The serpent] fit vessel, fittest imp of fraud, in whom To enter.

Vest

In state attended by her maiden train, Who bore the vests that holy rites require.

Not seldom clothed in radiant vest Deceitfully goes forth the morn.

Came vested all in white, pure as her mind.

With ether vested, and a purple sky.

Had I been vested with the monarch's power.

Empire and dominion was [were] vested in him.

Vestal

How happy is the blameless vestal's lot!

Vestige

What vestiges of liberty or property have they left?

Ridicule has followed the vestiges of Truth, but never usurped her place.

Vestment

The sculptor could not give vestments suitable to the quality of the persons represented.

Vestry

He said unto him that was over the vestry, Bring forth vestments for all the worshipers of Baal.

Vesture

Approach, and kiss her sacred vesture's hem.

Rocks, precipices, and gulfs, appareled with a vesture of plants.

There polished chests embroidered vestures graced.

Vestured

We be vestured with poor cloth.

Veteran

The insinuating eloquence and delicate flattery of veteran diplomatists and courtiers.

Ensigns that pierced the foe's remotest lines, The hardy veteran with tears resigns.

Veto

This contemptuous veto of her husband's on any intimacy with her family.

Vex

White curl the waves, and the vexed ocean roars.

Ten thousand torments vex my heart.

Some English wool, vexed in a Belgian loom.

Vexation

Passions too violent . . . afford us nothing but vexation and pain.

Those who saw him after a defeat looked in vain for any trace of vexation.

Your children were vexation to your youth.

Vexatious

He leads a vexatious life.

Viable

VIABLE, Vitae habilis, capable of living. This is said of a child who is born alive in such an advanced state of formation as to be capable of living. Unless be is born viable he acquires no rights and cannot transmit them to his heirs, and is considered as if he had never been born.

Vial

Take thou this vial, being then in bed, And this distilled liquor drink thou off.

Viand

Viands of various kinds allure the taste.

Vibrate

Breath vocalized, that is, vibrated or undulated, may . . . impress a swift, tremulous motion.

Star to star vibrates light.

Vibration

As a harper lays his open palm Upon his harp, to deaden its vibrations.

Vicariate

The vicariate of that part of Germany which is governed by the Saxon laws devolved on the elector of Saxony.

Vicarious

The soul in the body is but a subordinate efficient, and vicarious . . . in the hands of the Almighty.

The vicarious work of the Great Deliverer.

Vice

Withouten vice of syllable or letter.

Mark the vice of the procedure.

I do confess the vices of my blood.

Ungoverned appetite . . . a brutish vice.

When vice prevails, and impious men bear sway, The post of honor is a private station.

How like you the Vice in the play? . . . I would not give a rush for a Vice that has not a wooden dagger to snap at everybody.

The coachman's hand was viced between his upper and lower thigh.

Vicegerent

The symbol and vicegerent of the Deity.

Vicinage

Civil war had broken up all the usual ties of vicinage and good neighborhood.

Vicinity

A vicinity of disposition and relative tempers.

Vicious

Though I perchance am vicious in my guess.

The title of these lords was vicious in its origin.

A charge against Bentley of vicious reasoning.

Who . . . heard this heavy curse, Servant of servants, on his vicious race.

Vicissitude

God made two great lights . . . To illuminate the earth and rule the day In their vicissitude, and rule the night.

This man had, after many vicissitudes of fortune, sunk at last into abject and hopeless poverty.

Victim

Led like a victim, to my death I'll go.

Victor

In love, the victors from the vanquished fly; They fly that wound, and they pursue that die.

There, victor of his health, of fortune, friends, And fame, this lord of useless thousands ends.

Victorious

But I shall rise victorious, and subdue My vanquisher.

Now are our brows bound with victorious wreaths.

Victory

Death is swallowed up in victory.

God on our side, doubt not of victory.

Victory may be honorable to the arms, but shameful to the counsels, of a nation.

Victual

He was not able to keep that place three days for lack of victual.

There came a fair-hair'd youth, that in his hand Bare victual for the mowers.

Short allowance of victual.

I must go victual Orleans forthwith.

Victuals

Then had we plenty of victuals.

Vie

In a trading nation, the younger sons may be placed in such a way of life as . . . to vie with the best of their family.

While Waterloo with Cannae's carnage vies.

She hung about my neck; and kiss on kiss She vied so fast.

Nor was he set over us to vie wisdom with his Parliament, but to be guided by them.

And vying malice with my gentleness, Pick quarrels with their only happiness.

We 'll all to church together instantly, And then a vie for boys.

View

Thenceforth I thought thee worth my nearer view.

Objects near our view are thought greater than those of a larger size that are more remote.

Surveying nature with too nice a view.

I have with exact view perused thee, Hector.

The walls of Pluto's palace are in view.

'T is distance lends enchantment to the view.

To give a right view of this mistaken part of liberty.

No man sets himself about anything but upon some view or other which serves him for a reason.

[Graces] which, by the splendor of her view Dazzled, before we never knew.

O, let me view his visage, being dead.

Nearer to view his prey, and, unespied, To mark what of their state he more might learn.

The happiest youth, viewing his progress through.

Viewless

Swift through the valves the visionary fair Repassed, and viewless mixed with common air.

Viewy

A government intent on showy absurdities and viewy enterprises rather than solid work.

Vigil

Nothing wears out a fine face like the vigils of the card table and those cutting passions which attend them.

So they in heaven their odes and vigils tuned.

Be sober and keep vigil, The Judge is at the gate.

He that shall live this day, and see old age, Will yearly on the vigil feast his neighbors, And say, “To-morrow is St. Crispian.”

Vigilance

And flaming ministers to watch and tend Their earthly charge; of these the vigilance I dread.

Vigilant

Sirs, take your places, and be vigilant.

Vigor

The vigor of this arm was never vain.

But in the fruithful earth . . . His beams, unactive else, their vigor find.

Vigorous

Famed for his valor, young, At sea successful, vigorous and strong.

The beginnings of confederacies have been always vigorous and successful.

Viking

Of grim Vikings, and the rapture Of the sea fight, and the capture, And the life of slavery.

Vile

A poor man in vile raiment.

The craft either of fishing, which was Peter's, or of making tents, which was Paul's, were [was] more vile than the science of physic.

The inhabitants account gold but as a vile thing.

Behold, I am vile; what shall I answer thee ?

Vilify

When themselves they vilified To serve ungoverned appetite.

Many passions dispose us to depress and vilify the merit of one rising in the esteem of mankind.

I do vilify your censure.

Vilipend

To vilipend the art of portrait painting.

Vill

Not should e'er the crested fowl From thorp or vill his matins sound for me.

Villager

Brutus had rather be a villager Than to repute himself a son of Rome Under these hard condition.

Villain

If any of my ansectors was a tenant, and a servant, and held his lands as a villain to his lord, his posterity also must do so, though accidentally they become noble.

Pour the blood of the villain in one basin, and the blood of the gentleman in another, what difference shall there be proved?

Like a villain with a smiling cheek.

Calm, thinking villains, whom no faith could fix.

Villainy

The commendation is not in his wit, but in his villainy.

He never yet not vileinye ne said In all his life, unto no manner wight.

In our modern language, it [foul language] is termed villainy, as being proper for rustic boors, or men of coarsest education and employment.

Villainy till a very late day expressed words foul and disgraceful to the utterer much oftener than deeds.

Such villainies roused Horace into wrath.

That execrable sum of all villainies commonly called a slave trade.

Villanage

I speak even now as if sin were condemned in a perpetual villanage, never to be manumitted.

Some faint traces of villanage were detected by the curious so late as the days of the Stuarts.

Villanize

Were virtue by descent, a noble name Could never villanize his father's fame.

Vindicate

Is thine alone the seed that strews the plain? The birds of heaven shall vindicate their grain.

When the respondent denies any proposition, the opponent must directly vindicate . . . that proposition.

Laugh where we must, be candid where we can, But vindicate the ways of God to man.

I am confident he deserves much more That vindicates his country from a tyrant Than he that saves a citizen.

God is more powerful to exact subjection and to vindicate rebellion.

Vindication

Occasion for the vindication of this passage in my book.

Vindicative

Vindicative persons live the life of witches, who, as they are mischievous, so end they infortunate.

Vindicatory

The afflictions of Job were no vindicatory punishments to take vengeance of his sins.

Vindictive

I am vindictive enough to repel force by force.

Vine

There shall be no grapes on the vine.

And one went out into the field to gather herbs, and found a wild vine, and gathered thereof wild gourds.

Vinedresser

The sons of the shall be your plowmen and your vinedressers.

Vinegar

Here's the challenge: . . . I warrant there's vinegar and pepper in't.

Hoping that he hath vinegared his senses As he was bid.

Vinnewed

Many of Chaucer's words are become, as it were, vinnewed and hoary with over-long lying.

Viol

Me softer airs befit, and softer strings Of lute, or viol still, more apt for mournful things.

Violate

His wife Boadicea violated with stripes, his daughters with rape.

Violated vows 'Twixt the souls of friend and friend.

Oft have they violated The temple, oft the law, with foul affronts.

Violence

That seal You ask with such a violence, the king, Mine and your master, with his own hand gave me.

All the elements At least had gone to wrack, disturbed and torn With the violence of this conflict.

Do violence to do man.

We can not, without offering violence to all records, divine and human, deny an universal deluge.

Looking down, he saw The whole earth filled with violence.

Violent

Float upon a wild and violent sea.

A violent cross wind from either coast.

To bring forth more violent deeds.

Some violent hands were laid on Humphrey's life.

These violent delights have violent ends.

No violent state can be perpetual.

Ease would recant Vows made in pain, as violent and void.

The grief is fine, full, perfect, that I taste, And violenteth in a sense as strong As that which causeth it.

viper

There came a viper out of the heat, and fastened on his hand.

Who committed To such a viper his most sacred trust Of secrecy.

Virago

To arms! to arms! the fierce virago cries.

Virago . . . serpent under femininity.

Virelay

Of such matter made he many lays, Songs, complains, roundels, virelayes.

To which a lady sung a virelay.

Virgilian

The rich Virgilian rustic measure Of Lari Maxume.

Virgin

These are they which were not defiled with women; for they are virgins.

He his flesh hath overcome; He was a virgin, as he said.

Innocence and virgin modesty . . . That would be wooed, and unsought be won.

The white cold virgin snow upon my heart.

A few ounces of mutton, with a little virgin oil.

Virgule

In the MSS. of Chaucer, the line is always broken by a caesura in the middle, which is pointed by a virgule.

Virid

The virid marjoram Her sparkling beauty did but see.

Viripotent

Being not of ripe years, not viripotent.

Virtu

I had thoughts, in my chambers to place it in view, To be shown to my friends as a piece of virtù.

Virtual

Heat and cold have a virtual transition, without communication of substance.

Every kind that lives, Fomented by his virtual power, and warmed.

A thing has a virtual existence when it has all the conditions necessary to its actual existence.

To mask by slight differences in the manners a virtual identity in the substance.

Virtuality

In one grain of corn, there lieth dormant a virtuality of many other.

Virtue

Built too strong For force or virtue ever to expugn.

Jesus, immediately knowing in himself that virtue had gone out of him, turned him about.

A man was driven to depend for his security against misunderstanding, upon the pure virtue of his syntax.

The virtue of his midnight agony.

She moves the body which she doth possess, Yet no part toucheth, but by virtue's touch.

I made virtue of necessity.

In the Greek poets, . . . the economy of poems is better observed than in Terence, who thought the sole grace and virtue of their fable the sticking in of sentences.

Virtue only makes our bliss below.

If there's Power above us, And that there is all nature cries aloud Through all her works, he must delight in virtue.

H. I believe the girl has virtue. M. And if she has, I should be the last man in the world to attempt to corrupt it.

Thrones, dominations, princedoms, virtues, powers.

Virtueless

Virtueless she wished all herbs and charms.

Virtuosity

This famous passage . . . over which the virtuosity of modern times, rejoicing in evil, has hung so fondly.

Virtuoso

Virtuoso the Italians call a man who loves the noble arts, and is a critic in them.

Virtuous

Old Priam's son, amongst them all, was chiefly virtuous.

Lifting up his virtuous staff on high, He smote the sea, which calméd was with speed.

Every virtuous plant and healing herb.

The virtuous mind that ever walks attended By a strong siding champion, conscience.

Mistress Ford . . . the virtuous creature, that hath the jealous fool to her husband.

Virulence

The virulence of one declaimer, or the profundities and sublimities of the other.

Virulent

A contagious disorder rendered more virulent by uncleanness.

Visage

His visage was so marred more than any man.

Love and beauty still that visage grace.

Visible

Maker of heaven and earth, and of all things visible and invisible.

Virtue made visible in outward grace.

The factions at court were greater, or more visible, than before.

Vision

Faith here is turned into vision there.

The baseless fabric of this vision.

No dreams, but visions strange.

For them no visioned terrors daunt, Their nights no fancied specters haunt.

Visionary

The visionary hour When musing midnight reigns.

Or lull to rest the visionary maid.

Visit

[God] hath visited and redeemed his people.

Visitant

When the visitant comes again, he is no more a stranger.

Visitation

Nothing but peace and gentle visitation.

What will ye do in the day of visitation?

Visitatorial

An archdeacon has visitatorial power.

The queen, however, still had over the church a visitatorial power of vast and undefined extent.

Visitor

The king is the visitor of all lay corporations.

Visive

I can not satisfy myself how men should be so little surprised about this visive faculty.

Visor

My weaker government since, makes you pull off the visor.

Visored

Visored falsehood and base forgery.

Vista

The finished garden to the view Its vistas opens, and its alleys green.

In the groves of their academy, at the end of every vista, you see nothing but the gallows.

The shattered tower which now forms a vista from his window.

Visto

Through the long visto of a thousand years.

Visual

The air, Nowhere so clear, sharpened his visual ray.

Visualize

No one who has not seen them [glaciers] can possibly visualize them.

Vital

Do the heavens afford him vital food?

And vital virtue infused, and vital warmth.

The dart flew on, and pierced a vital part.

A competence is vital to content.

Pythagoras and Hippocrates . . . affirm the birth of the seventh month to be vital.

Vitiate

A will vitiated and growth out of love with the truth disposes the understanding to error and delusion.

Without care it may be used to vitiate our minds.

This undistinguishing complaisance will vitiate the taste of readers.

Vitiation

The vitiation that breeds evil acts.

Vitiosity

The perverseness and vitiosity of man's will.

Vitrify

Chymists make vessels of animal substances, calcined, which will not vitrify in the fire.

Vituperation

When a man becomes untractable and inaccessible by fierceness and pride, then vituperation comes upon him.

Vituperative

Vituperative appellations derived from their real or supposed ill qualities.

Viva

A wilder burst of “vivas”.

Vivacious

Hitherto the English bishops have been vivacious almost to wonder. . . . But five died for the first twenty years of her [Queen Elizabeth's] reign.

The faith of Christianity is far more vivacious than any mere ravishment of the imagination can ever be.

Vivacity

The vivacity of some of these pensioners is little less than a miracle, they lived so long.

Vively

If I see a thing vively represented on the stage.

vivers

I 'll join you at three, if the vivers can tarry so long.

vivid

In dazzling streaks the vivid lightnings play.

Arts which present, with all the vivid charms of painting, the human face and human form divine.

Body is a fit workhouse for sprightly, vivid faculties to exercise . . . themselves in.

Vivificate

God vivificates and actuates the whole world.

Vivify

Sitting on eggs doth vivify, not nourish.

Vixen

She was a vixen when she went to school.

Vizard

To mislead and betray them under the vizard of law.

Vocable

Swamped near to drowning in a tide of ingenious vocables.

Vocabulary

His vocabulary seems to have been no larger than was necessary for the transaction of business.

Vocal

To hill or valley, fountain, or fresh shade, Made vocal by my song.

Vocalic

The Gaelic language being uncommonly vocalic.

Vocalize

It is one thing to give an impulse to breath alone, another thing to vocalize that breath.

Vocation

What can be urged for them who not having the vocation of poverty to scribble, out of mere wantonness make themselves ridiculous?

He would think his service greatly rewarded, if he might obtain by that means to live in the sight of his prince, and yet practice his own chosen vocation.

Every member of the same [the Church], in his vocation and ministry.

Vociferate

Though he may vociferate the word liberty.

Vociferation

Violent gesture and vociferation naturally shake the hearts of the ignorant.

Plaintive strains succeeding the vociferations of emotion or of pain.

Vogue

One vogue, one vein, One air of thoughts usurps my brain.

Whatsoever its vogue may be, I still flatter myself that the parents of the growing generation will be satisfied with what to be taught to their children in Westminster, in Eton, or in Winchester.

Use may revive the obsoletest words, And banish those that now are most in vogue.

Voice

He with a manly voice saith his message.

Her voice was ever soft, Gentle, and low; an excellent thing in woman.

Thy voice is music.

Join thy voice unto the angel choir.

After the fire a still small voice.

Canst thou thunder with a voice like him?

The floods have lifted up their voice.

O Marcus, I am warm'd; my heart Leaps at the trumpet's voice.

I desire to be present with you now, and to change my voice; for I stand in doubt of you.

My voice is in my sword.

Let us call on God in the voice of his church.

Sic. How now, my masters! have you chose this man? 1 Cit. He has our voices, sir.

Some laws ordain, and some attend the choice Of holy senates, and elect by voice.

So shall ye perish; because ye would not be obedient unto the voice of the Lord your God.

It was voiced that the king purposed to put to death Edward Plantagenet.

Voiceful

Beheld the Iliad and the Odyssey Rise to the swelling of the voiceful sea.

Voiceless

I live and die unheard, With a most voiceless thought, sheathing it as a sword.

Void

The earth was without form, and void.

I 'll get me to a place more void.

I 'll chain him in my study, that, at void hours, I may run over the story of his country.

Divers great offices that had been long void.

A conscience void of offense toward God.

He that is void of wisdom despiseth his neighbor.

[My word] shall not return to me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please.

I will make void the counsel of Judah.

Pride, where wit fails, steps in to our defense, And fills up all the mighty void of sense.

Void anon her place.

If they will fight with us, bid them come down, Or void the field.

A watchful application of mind in voiding prejudices.

With shovel, like a fury, voided out The earth and scattered bones.

After they had voided the obligation of the oath he had taken.

It was become a practice . . . to void the security that was at any time given for money so borrowed.

Voidable

If the metropolitan . . . grants letters of administration, such administration is not, but voidable by sentence.

Voider

Piers Plowman laid the cloth, and Simplicity brought in the voider.

The cloth whereon the earl dined was taken away, and the voider, wherein the plate was usually put, was set upon the cupboard's head.

Volage

They wroughten all their lust volage.

Volant

English silver now was current, and our gold volant in the pope's court.

Volatile

You are as giddy and volatile as ever.

Volatilize

The water . . . dissolving the oil, and volatilizing it by the action.

Volition

Volition is the actual exercise of the power the mind has to order the consideration of any idea, or the forbearing to consider it.

Volition is an act of the mind, knowingly exerting that dominion it takes itself to have over any part of the man, by employing it in, or withholding it from, any particular action.

Volley

Fiery darts in flaming volleys flew.

Each volley tells that thousands cease to breathe.

Rattling nonsense in full volleys breaks.

Voluble

[Cassio,] a knave very voluble.

Volume

The papyrus, and afterward the parchment, was joined together [by the ancients] to form one sheet, and then rolled upon a staff into a volume (volumen).

An odd volume of a set of books bears not the value of its proportion to the set.

So glides some trodden serpent on the grass, And long behind wounded volume trails.

Undulating billows rolling their silver volumes.

Volumed

The distant torrent's rushing sound Tells where the volumed cataract doth roll.

Voluminous

But ended foul in many a scaly fold, Voluminous and vast.

Over which dusky draperies are hanging, and voluminous curtains have long since fallen.

Voluntary

That sin or guilt pertains exclusively to voluntary action is the true principle of orthodoxy.

Our voluntary service he requires.

She fell to lust a voluntary prey.

God did not work as a necessary, but a voluntary, agent, intending beforehand, and decreeing with himself, that which did outwardly proceed from him.

Voluptuary

A good-humored, but hard-hearted, voluptuary.

Voluptuous

Music arose with its voluptuous swell.

Sink back into your voluptuous repose.

Softened with pleasure and voluptuous life.

Vomit

The fish . . . vomited out Jonah upon the dry land.

Like the sons of Vulcan, vomit smoke.

Like vomit from his yawning entrails poured.

He gives your Hollander a vomit.

Vomitory

Sixty-four vomitories . . . poured forth the immense multitude.

Votarist

Like a sad votarist in palmer's weed.

Votary

Votary resolution is made equipollent to custom.

'T was coldness of the votary, not the prayer, that was in fault.

But thou, my votary, weepest thou?

Vote

The freeman casting with unpurchased hand The vote that shakes the turrets of the land.

The vote for a duelist is to assist in the prostration of justice, and, indirectly, to encourage the crime.

To vote on large principles, to vote honestly, requires a great amount of information.

Parliament voted them one hundred thousand pounds.

Votive

We reached a votive stone, that bears the name Of Aloys Reding.

Embellishments of flowers and votive garlands.

Vouch

[They] vouch (as I might say) to their aid the authority of the writers.

Vouch the silent stars and conscious moon.

They made him ashamed to vouch the truth of the relation, and afterwards to credit it.

Me damp horror chilled At such bold words vouched with a deed so bold.

He vouches the tenant in tail, who vouches over the common vouchee.

He will not believe her until the elector of Hanover shall vouch for the truth of what she has . . . affirmed.

The vouch of very malice itself.

Voucher

Will his vouchers vouch him no more?

The great writers of that age stand up together as vouchers for one another's reputation.

Vouchsafe

If ye vouchsafe that it be so.

Shall I vouchsafe your worship a word or two?

It is not said by the apostle that God vouchsafed to the heathens the means of salvation.

Vouchsafe, O Lord, to keep us this day without sin.

Vouchsafe, illustrious Ormond, to behold What power the charms of beauty had of old.

Vow

I pray thee, let me go and pay my vow.

I am combined by a sacred vow.

Knights of love, who never broke their vow; Firm to their plighted faith.

[Men] that vow a long and weary pilgrimage.

Better is it that thou shouldest not vow, than that thou shouldest vow and not pay.

Voyage

I love a sea voyage and a blustering tempest.

So steers the prudent crane Her annual voyage, borne on winds.

All the voyage of their life Is bound in shallows and in miseries.

Nations have interknowledge of one another by voyage into foreign parts, or strangers that come to them.

A mind forever Voyaging through strange seas of thought alone.

With what pain [I] voyaged the unreal, vast, unbounded deep.

Vulcanian

Ingenious allusions to the Vulcanian panoply which Achilles lent to his feebler friend.

Vulgar

Things vulgar, and well-weighed, scarce worth the praise.

It might be more useful to the English reader . . . to write in our vulgar language.

The mechanical process of multiplying books had brought the New Testament in the vulgar tongue within the reach of every class.

Men who have passed all their time in low and vulgar life.

In reading an account of a battle, we follow the hero with our whole attention, but seldom reflect on the vulgar heaps of slaughter.

Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.

These vile vulgars are extremely proud.

Vulgarism

A fastidious taste will find offense in the occasional vulgarisms, or what we now call “slang,” which not a few of our writers seem to have affected.

Vulgarity

The reprobate vulgarity of the frequenters of Bartholomew Fair.

Vulgarize

Exhortation vulgarized by low wit.

Vulnerable

Achilles was vulnerable in his heel; and there will be wanting a Paris to infix the dart.

His skill in finding out the vulnerable parts of strong minds was consummate.

Vulpinism

He was without guile, and had no vulpinism at all.

Vulturine

The vulturine nose, which smells nothing but corruption, is no credit to its possessor.