Spurred Quotes & Sayings

A blowing rain lashed at Jon's face as he spurred his horse across the swollen stream. — George R R Martin

The current disfavor into which socialism has fallen has spurred ... the frenzy to proclaim oneself a liberal. Many writers today have recourse to the strategem of inventing for oneself a liberalism according to one's own tastes and passing it off as an evolution from past ideas. — Ralph Raico

One of the things that kept our marriage intact was community. Friends who spurred us on to finish strong together. And it's friends who esteem marriage that will do this; not people who belittle it or question the value of it. — Ashleigh Slater

The experience of Somalia shows that famine in the late 20th century is not a consequence of a shortage of food. On the contrary, famines are spurred on as result of a global oversupply of grain staples. — Michel Chossudovsky

If in the heat of the dispute he insists and asks, 'Am I not the master of throwing myself out of the window?' I shall answer him, no; that whilst he preserves his reason there is no probability that the desire of proving his free agency, will become a motive sufficiently powerful to make him sacrifice his life to the attempt: if, notwithstanding this, to prove he is a free agent, he should actually precipitate himself from the window, it would not be a sufficient warranty to conclude he acted freely, but rather that it was the violence of his temperament which spurred him on to this folly. Madness is a state, that depends upon the heat of the blood, not upon the will. A fanatic or a hero, braves death as necessarily as a more phlegmatic man or a coward flies from it. — Paul Henri Thiry D'Holbach

Adam didn't need his father to go to jail. He had merely needed someone outside the situation to look at it and confirm that yes, a crime had been committed. Adam had not invented it, spurred it, deserved it. It said so on the court paperwork. Robert Parrish, guilty. Adam Parrish, free. — Maggie Stiefvater

Finally, spurred by the appetite to which he was indifferent, he took any one, read the printing on the parti-colored label of paper. He held the soup can like a skull; and at once he did not want it. The soup was made from celery. Mr. Lecky put it back. He stood in mild misery, harassed again by the plague of a will impotent in its restored freedom.
If the mind cannot direct, it can be cunning to protect its ease. Mr. Lecky now proposed a fantastic pact to himself. He shut his eyes. He reached again and took a can. Eyes still shut, he ripped the label from it, crumpled and threw away the paper. Now he could not tell what he had until he opened it. — James Gould Cozzens

One should be ever booted and spurred and ready to depart. — Michel De Montaigne

If someone had told me, don't say anything about Lillian Hellman because she'll sue you, it wouldn't have stopped me. It might have spurred me on. — Lillian Hellman

Obama also allowed Hillary supporters to insert an absurd statement into the platform suggesting that media sexism spurred her loss and that 'demeaning portrayals of women ... dampen the dreams of our daughters' [ ... ] It would have been better to put this language in the platform: 'A woman who wildly mismanages and bankrupts a quarter-of-a-billion-dollar campaign operation, and then blames sexism in society, will dampen the dreams of our daughters.' — Maureen Dowd

Thank you.
For Max Vandenburg, those were the two most pitiful words he could possibly say, rivaled only by I'm sorry. There was a constant urge to speak both expressions, spurred on by the affliction of guilt. — Markus Zusak

Some historians, in fact, suggest Hartford recruiters may have pioneered strategies that spurred the great migration of Southern rural blacks to Northern cities. — Susan Eaton

My thoughts can sometimes be spurred by what I read, but my reading is extremely eclectic. — Robyn Davidson

They rode out together from the shadows of the trees, leaving the Bala Hissar and the glowing torch of the burning Residency behind them, and spurred away across the flat lands towards the mountains ...
And it may even be that they found their Kingdom. — M.M. Kaye

I have always been spurred on by my not finding expressed anywhere the kinds of perspectives that I thought these issues most perspicuously needed and deserved; but that is just another way of saying that Americans have overwhelmingly expunged from their public understanding the strongest and most clarifying resources out of ancient and traditional European cultures. By far we prefer our familiar and user-friendly parochialisms, and there is no percentage in trying to pry these pachydermal plates apart. — Kenny Smith

Peter Lake spurred the horse again, and extended his right arm like a lance, pointing it at the motionless officer. As they went by in a blur of white, he lifted the man's cap from his head, saying, "Allow me to take your hat." The enraged policeman pivoted, took out his notebook, and furiously wrote a description of the horse's buttocks. — Mark Helprin

I was thinking back to all the time in the gym, working hard, and that spurred me on [winning New York marathon just ten months after giving birth — Paula Radcliffe

For centuries, economic thinkers, from Adam Smith to John Maynard Keynes, have tried to identify the elusive formula that makes some countries more prosperous and successful than others. My curiosity about this topic spurred me, as a young professor of economics in the late 1970s, to research new ways of measuring national competitiveness. — Klaus Schwab

Agribusiness could provide an opportunity for joint Israeli-Palestinian projects, spurred on by Israeli technical expertise in this field. — Edgar Bronfman, Sr.

The crowd were totally behind him and it spurred him on, I was right in the heat of battle. There was only one to win; I dug deep and summoned up every bit of strength, I had in me to put in to one punch to see if I could hit the jackpot. I drew him to the ropes and put everything in to a cracking right uppercut and just missed, bastard! — Stephen Richards

The Right likes to think that intellectuals and academics like Allan Bloom and Dinesh D'Souza spurred the explosive growth of movement conservatism in the 1980s and 1990s, when it was actually mostly Rush Limbaugh. — Alex Pareene

The long matrimonial haul was accomplished in cycles. One cycle of bad breath, one cycle of renewed desire, a third cycle of breakdown and small avoidances, still another of plays and dinners that spurred a conversation between them late at night that reminded her of their like minds and the pleasure they took in each other's talk. And then back to hating him for not taking out the garbage on Wednesday. That was the struggle. Sickness and death, caretaking, the martyrdom of matrimony
that was fluff stuff. When the vows kick in, you don't even blink. You just do. She had to be up for it. — Joshua Ferris

I was screaming and hitting at him, but he thought it all so very funny, and he draped me belly down on the saddle in front of him and then he spurred into the chaos to continue the killing.
And that was how I met Ragnar, Ragnar the Fearless, my brother's killer, and the man whose head was supposed to grace a pole on Bebbanburg's ramparts, Earl Ragnar. — Bernard Cornwell

Dreams seem to be spurred on not by reason but by desire, not by the head but by the heart, and yet what complicated tricks my reason has played sometimes in dreams. — Fyodor Dostoevsky

Persons who have a strong sense of efficacy deploy their attention and effort to the demands of the situation and are spurred by obstacles to greater effort. — Albert Bandura

My mum said to me once years ago, which really spurred me on, 'You're the funniest person I know'. I loved that. — Miranda Hart

Since boyhood, fury had become his father. His older brother. His only protector. Fury gave him strength and courage and spurred him to always move forward despite always getting things wrong and always failing and no mentor there to help him or teach him and everyone always laughing. Anger delivered him from catastrophe. Rage kept him from going under. It had come to be his greatest asset and only strategy. — Chuck Palahniuk

Time cannot be spurred on like a horse. — Kobo Abe

On the street, men appeared to me like mad ghosts, old skeletons out of joint, whose bones, badly strung together, were falling to the pavement with a strange noise. I saw the necks turning on top of broken spinal columns, hanging upon disjointed clavicles, arms sundered from the trunks, the trunks themselves losing their shape. And all these scraps of human bodies, stripped of their flesh by death, were rushing upon one another, forever spurred on by a homicidal fever, forever driven by pleasure, and they were fighting over foul carrion. — Octave Mirbeau

At present, however, science, spurred on by its powerful delusion, is hurrying unstoppably to its limits, where the optimism hidden in the essence oflogic will founder and break up. For there is an infinite number ofpoints on the periphery ofthe circle ofscience, and while we have no way of foreseeing how the circle could ever be completed, a noble and gifted man inevitably encounters, before the mid-point of his existence, boundary points on the periphery like this, where he stares into that which cannot be illuminated. When, to his horror, he sees how logic curls up around itself at these limits and finally bites its own tail, then a new form ofknowledge breaks through, tragic knowledge, which, simply to be endured, needs art for protection and as medicine."
Friedrich Nietzsche, "Foreword to Richard Wagner" in The Birth of Tragedy, ed. R. Geuss & R. Speirs, Cambridge, 2007, 163. (p.114) — Friedrich Nietzsche

Spurred by Amy's death I've tried to salvage unwilling victims from the mayhem of the internal storm and am always, always just pulled inside myself. — Russell Brand

Psychological studies have recently shown that adversity can be a more powerful motivator than support. Successful people often remember being told that they could not do what they have, in fact, done brilliantly. Stubbornness drove them. Their parents or teachers have told them they will never make any money, or that they will never get a college degree, or that they will never marry and have children. The urge to prove authority wrong has often spurred human beings to unusual success. — Susan Cheever

What? We feel aesthetic pleasure at a sonata by Beethoven and not at one with the same style and charm if it comes from one of our own contemporaries? Isn't that the height of hypocrisy? So then the sensation of beauty is not spontaneous, spurred by our sensibility, but instead is cerebral, conditioned by our knowing a date?
No way around it: historical consciousness is so thoroughly inherent in our perception of art that this anachronism (a Beethoven piece written today) would be spontaneously (that is, without the least hypocrisy) felt to be ridiculous, false, incongruous, even monstrous. Our feeling for continuity is so strong that it enters into the perception of any work of art. — Milan Kundera

Pinocchio, spurred on by the hope of finding his father and of being in time to save him, swam all night long. — Carlo Collodi

There is a drop of blood in the snow before me ... The coyote ... is in estrus ... spurred to let out a bit of herself, sending a message, telling everyone she was now ready, that the clock of her winter was ticking toward spring. — Craig Childs

Hauriou, became a crown witness for us when he confirmed this connection in 1916, in the midst of WWI: The revolution of 1789 had no other goal than absolute access to the writing of legal statutes and the systematic destruction of customary institutions. It resulted in a state of permanent revolution because the mobility of the writing of laws did not provide for the stability of certain customary institutions, because the forces of change were stronger than the forces of stability. Social and political life in France was completely emptied of institutions and was only able to provisionally maintain itself by sudden jolts spurred by the heightened morality. — Carl Schmitt

Five minutes later, with Calypso's arms around his waist, Leo spurred Festus into flight. The bronze dragon spread his wings, and they soared into the unknown. — Rick Riordan

Democratic periodicals in the North warned that the governor's stance would compromise highly profitable New York trade connections with Virginia and other slave states. Seward was branded "a bigoted New England fanatic." This only emboldened Seward's resolve to press the issue. He spurred the Whig-dominated state legislature to pass a series of antislavery laws affirming the rights of black citizens against seizure by Southern agents, guaranteeing a trial by jury for any person so apprehended, and prohibiting New York police officers and jails from involvement in the apprehension of fugitive slaves. — Doris Kearns Goodwin

The danger for the writer who is spurred by the religious view of the world is that he will consider this to be two operations instead of one. He will try to enshrine the mystery without the fact, and there will follow a further set of separations which are inimical to art. Judgement will be separated from vision, nature from grace, and reason from imagination.
They are separations which we see in our society and which exist in our writing. They are separations which faith tends to heal if we realize that faith is a 'walking in darkness' and not a theological solution to mystery. The poet is traditionally a blind man, but the Christian poet, and storyteller as well, is like the blind man whom Christ touched... — Flannery O'Connor

As his people positioned themselves in and around the pass, Arin though that he might have misunderstood the Valorian addiction to war. He had assumed it was spurred by greed. By a savage sense of superiority. It had never occurred to him that Valorians also went to war because of love.
Arin loved those hours of waiting. The silent, brilliant tension, like scribbles of heat lightning. His city far below and behind him, his hand on a cannon's curve, ears open to the acoustics of the pass. He stared into it, and even though he smelled the reek of fear from men and women around him, he was caught in a kind of wonder.He felt so vibrant. As if his life was fresh, translucent, thin-skinned fruit. It could be sliced apart and he wouldn't care. Nothing felt like this. — Marie Rutkoski

He pulled her close and kissed her. Happiness and joy settled around them like a warm cloak. And gentleness spurred passion. His kiss deepened and a soft, low moan eased out of his throat.
He wiggled on the bed beneath her, letting her feel the resurgence of his passion inside her.
"I'm ready to do it again," he said plainly.
"You can't do it twice," she answered, giggling.
"Why not?"
"You just can't," Althea told him. "Men do it one time and then they rest up for a day or two."
"I think I'm rested up enough," he told her.
"Jesse, I know what I'm talking about," she said with confidence. "I was married for over two years. And I know all about it. You can't be ready to do it again."
He proved her wrong. — Pamela Morsi

Lije . . . yeah, that's it, baby . . . God, fuck . . ." And then Tom came, spurred on by Prophet's climax, dragged along for the ride. — S.E. Jakes

Alric! Stop it!" Pickering snapped at him. "You mustn't let the men see you crying!"
Fury flared in Alric, and he spun on the count. "No? No? Look at them! They are dying for me. They are dying on my order! I say they do have a right to see their king! They all have a right to see their king!"
Alric wiped the tears from his cheeks and gathered his reins. "I'm tired of this. I'm tired of having my face put in the dirt! I won't stand it. I'm tired of being helpless. That's my city, built by my ancestors! If my people chose to fight, then, by Maribor, I want them to know it's me they fight!"
The prince put on his helm, drew his father's large sword and spurred his horse forward, not at the trench but at the castle gate itself. — Michael J. Sullivan

I never could believe that Providence had sent a few men into the world, ready booted and spurred to ride, and millions ready saddled and bridled to be ridden. — Richard Rumbold

I may say this is a deluded generation, veiled with ignorance, that tho[ugh] popery and slavery be riding in upon them, do not perceive it; tho[ugh] I am sure there was no man born marked of God above another, for none comes into the world with a saddle on his back, neither any booted and spurred to ride him. — Richard Rumbold

Vagueness spurred him into knight errantry. — E. M. Forster

And what,' he asked the dragons, 'so spurred their zeal?'
'Vengeance, of course. And Anomandaris. — Steven Erikson

Spurred on by both the science and science fiction of our time, my generation of researchers and engineers grew up to ask what if? and what's next? We went on to pursue new disciplines like computer vision, artificial intelligence, real-time speech translation, machine learning, and quantum computing. — Elizabeth Bear

She'd known girls on diets her entire life. Iron-rich blood had rarely, if ever, been their goal. Most of them had been looking for smaller waists, clearer complexions, and richer boyfriends, spurred on by a deeply ingrained self-loathing that had been manufactured for them before they were old enough to understand the kind of quicksand they were sinking in. — Seanan McGuire

Lord Francis sighed. "When you get back to Bedlam, Soph," he said, "ask them to reserve a room for me, will you? There's a good girl. I am going to be needing it soon." Sophia clucked her tongue and spurred her horse to a canter. Lord Francis shook his head and went after her. — Mary Balogh

dramatically the number of homicides. This had spurred a — Michael Connelly

The supernova is enabling a deeper revolution that is just beginning, spurred by learning platforms such as Udacity, edX, and Coursera, that will change the very metabolism and shape of higher education and, one hopes, lift the adaptability line in the way that — Thomas L. Friedman

But nobody predicted anything of this magnitude in terms of resistance. And in part, the magnitude of the resistance was spurred by our failures in reconstruction. — Wayne White

So much of the literature we had to read for high school English class was filled with victimized, tragic, symbolic women who spurred the plot forward with their inevitable shunning/death/shunning-followed-by-pregnancy-followed-by-death timelines. — Libba Bray

Every age has its peculiar folly: Some scheme, project, or fantasy into which it plunges, spurred on by the love of gain, the necessity of excitement, or the force of imitation. — Charles Mackay

And what is happy? It is a going always on. There is something better to be done than I have done, and spurred by the fair delusion of progress, I will seek to progress, to whip myself on, to more and more- to learning. Always. — Sylvia Plath

Much of what was to become modern art and the changed concept of the function of museums was spurred by a cadre of women on the East Coast who changed the face of American museums. Women like Gertrude Vanderbilt Whitney (Whitney Museum of American Art), Lillie Bliss (Museum of Modern Art), and Abby Rockefeller (Museum of Modern Art), contributed their significant influence, wealth, and tireless enthusiasm to promoting contemporary art and artists. — Ivy Hendy

May you be spurred into action, not just by what you read - but all your Soul is willing to share. — Eleesha

In any love-story there are usually two stages or phases. There is the initial stage, where love is expressed by the giving of gifts, especially the gift of self. Then there comes a time when it is no longer enough to give gifts to the beloved, but one has to be ready to suffer for her or for him. Only then can it be seen whether the love is real. In the story of a vocation to consecrated virginity there are also usually two stages. There is the initial stage of the vocation, when, spurred on by grace and attracted by the ideal, one joyfully and enthusiastically says, "Yes, Lord, here I am!" Then comes the time of solitude of heart, of weariness, of crisis, when, in order to maintain that "Yes," one has to die — Raniero Cantalamessa

In my world, a woman was the most powerful thing that I knew. Still is. A woman made the money in my house; a woman made my food. A woman beat my ass when I wasn't a good kid. Women were behind a lot of what spurred South Africa toward democracy. — Trevor Noah

He thought that it was loneliness which he was trying to escape and not himself. But the street ran on: catlike, one place was the same as another to him. But in none of them could he be quiet. But the street ran on in its moods and phases, always empty: he might have seen himself as in numberless avatars, in silence, doomed with motion, driven by the courage of flagged and spurred despair; by the despair of courage whose opportunities had to be flagged and spurred. — William Faulkner

Inside Laila too a battle was being waged : guilt on one side, partnered with shame, and, on the other, the conviction that what she and Tariq had done was not sinful; that it had been natural, good, beautiful, even inevitable, spurred by the knowledge that they might never see each other again. — Khaled Hosseini

In the burning and devastated cities, we daily experienced the direct impact of war. It spurred us to do our utmost ... the bombing and the hardships that resulted from them (did not) weaken the morale of the populace. — Albert Speer

One glance and I knew exactly who and what he was. The classic alpha male, the kind who had spurred evolution forward about five million years ago by nailing every female in sight. They charmed, seduced, and behaved like bastards, and yet women were biologically incapable of resisting their magic DNA. — Lisa Kleypas

Several times in Earth's history, rapid global warming occurred, apparently spurred by amplifying feedbacks. In each case, more than half of plant and animal species became extinct. New species came into being over tens and hundreds of thousands of years. But these are time scales and generations that we cannot imagine. — James Hansen

My parents read to me a lot as a kid, and I started writing very early, probably spurred on by Aesop's fables. Then they gave me The Lord of the Rings way too early for me to fully understand what I was reading, which was actually kind of cool. It was almost better - comprehension's overrated when you're reading. — Jeff VanderMeer

Spurred on by a voice which must have come from the hideous soul of the forest, I resolved to enter the beckoning gloom in spite of the ponderous chains which barred my passage. — H.P. Lovecraft

There was little of the religious idealism or of the search for personal freedom that motivated the Pilgrims in 1620 and none of the search to create a "City on a Hill" that spurred the Puritans to take ships for Boston in 1630. To these financial backers, the settlement of Virginia was primarily about trade and money. — Kieran Doherty

The mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God. — Thomas Jefferson

The event concept was sparked from a shared observation amongst these leading lifestyle brands that the economic rebound has spurred greater liquidity into real estate, the stock market is setting new heights and consumers are generally stepping out more for luxury goods and services. After many years of pulling back, it was fun to see guests flirting with temptation, whether that was a new home, a new car, a new look or just to learn more about the trends. Others were happy to take in all the action. — Andrea Savage

Readiness is a form of humility, spurred by a recognition of how little we can know or control. Hardship is unavoidable. Resilient people recognize this reality. Then they prepare themselves for it, seeking to meet it as best they can, on their own terms. — Eric Greitens

Indeed, this crisis was also spurred by the abandonment of professional ideals in the pursuit of profit that made managed care necessary in the first place. — Sandeep Jauhar

My work was practice, practice, practice. Discouragement and weariness cast me down frequently; but the next moment the thought that I should soon be at home and show my loved ones what I had accomplished spurred me on, and I eagerly looked forward to their pleasure in my achievement. — Helen Keller

Bags were shoved on all of our heads once more. Hands grabbed me and spurred me forward. "Rick," Zach said behind us. The hands guiding me stopped. The bag was ripped off my head again, and I found myself looking into Zach's eyes. "Bring the girl tomorrow night," he said.
The last thing I wanted to do was bring Rimmel into a room full of these assholes. "What the fuck for?"
He smiled. It looked more like a sneer. "I'd like to meet the nerd. I hear you've become quite smitten."
The more he talked about her, the more he implied he knew her, the more pissed off I got. I lunged forward and shoved my face right up in his. Satisfaction speared me when his eyes widened just a fraction. He wasn't as tough as he thought he was.
"Well, since you seem to know everything," I said, dead calm, "then you must also know that I take care of what's mine. You might be president of this frat, but I own the campus. Do. Not. Push. Me."
- Zach & Romeo — Cambria Hebert

The intellectuals and the young, booted and spurred, feel themselves born to ride us. — Eric Hoffer

Judge moaned and rose up to his knees in answer. Michaels gripped the base of his dick. "Oh my god. Look at you." Michaels put his tongue deep inside Judge's cavern, stabbing it in and out without mercy. Judge's sensual moans spurred him on, had him overwhelmed with wanting him. Michaels quickly spread some lube down his length. Holding on to Judge's shoulder with one hand, he parted one fuzzy cheek with the other and slid his lubed cock up and down that dark crevice. Driving both of them mad. "Fuck me. Austin." Michaels — A.E. Via

A good horse should be seldom spurred. — Thomas Fuller

One of the things that helps use cope with loss is the fact that while memories may remian, the emotions associated with them will fade like old photographs. At the same time, there is a masochistic desire to retain those feelings spurred on by the dread of losing the power they hold. Sometimes I can't think of anything more awful than simply being human. — James Pratt

At the top of the Queen's Staircase at the Tuileries, there is a series of communicating chambers, crowded every day with clerks, secretaries, messengers, with army officers and purveyors, officials of the Commune and officers of the courts: with government couriers, booted and spurred, waiting for dispatches from the last room in the suite. Look down: outside there are cannon and files of soldiers. The room at the end was once the private office of Louis the Last. You cannot go in.
That room is now the office of the Committee of Public Safety. The Committee exists to supervise the Council of Ministers and to expedite its decisions. — Hilary Mantel

The Electric Monk's day was going tremendously well and he broke into an excited gallop. That is to say that, excitedly, he spurred his horse to a gallop and, unexcitedly, his horse broke into it. — Douglas Adams

Former Journey lead singer Steve Perry was a lifelong Giants fan who grew up in the San Joaquin Valley. When the Dodgers started showing him on the big screen during their nightly sing-along, Perry protested by sneaking out of his seats before the eighth inning began. Now the Giants were making their playoff run, and Perry had become a regular sight at AT&T park, thrashing around from a club-level suite as he spurred on the crowd. — Andrew Baggarly

Spurred by the unlimited texting plans offered by carriers like AT&T Mobility and Verizon Wireless, American teenagers sent and received an average of 2,272 text messages per month in the fourth quarter of 2008, according to the Nielsen Company - almost 80 messages a day, more than double the average of a year earlier. — Katie Hafner

Yorda turned away from the shadow-creature just as its claws were about to close on her shoulders. Her eyes met Ico's, then fell to his outstretched hand.
Finally, fear spurred her to action. She ran and jumped. — Miyuki Miyabe

He saw his enemies stealthily darting from rock to tree, and tree to bush, creeping through the brush, and slipping closer and closer every moment. On three sides were his hated foes and on the remaining side - the abyss. Without a moment's hesitation the intrepid Major spurred his horse at the precipice. Never shall I forget that thrilling moment. The three hundred savages were silent as they realized the Major's intention. Those in the fort watched with staring eyes. A few bounds and the noble steed reared high on his hind legs. Outlined by the clear blue sky the magnificent animal stood for one brief instant, his black mane flying in the wind, his head thrown up and his front hoofs pawing the air like Marcus Curtius' mailed steed of old, and then down with a crash, a cloud of dust, and the crackling of pine limbs. — Zane Grey

There is a natural limit to the success we wish our friends, even when we have spurred them on their way. — Agnes Repplier

Love will not be spurred to what it loathes — William Shakespeare

There is real hope for a culture that makes it as easy to buy a book as it does a pack of cigarettes."--a civic leader quoted in a New American Library ad (1951) American Pulp tells the story of the midcentury golden age of pulp paperbacks and how they brought modernism to Main Street, democratized literature and ideas, spurred social mobility, and helped readers fashion new identities. — Paula Rabinowitz

the German and Japanese governments heavily subsidized their chemical industries for war purposes. Government subsidies, direct or indirect, spurred German developments in synthetic rubber and plastics, synthetic fuels, light metals, and various other substitutes for natural materials.
However, the world's chemical industries would have grown rapidly without artificial encouragement. — George W. Stocking

Continental Drift

you have moved through
like an ice flow-
steady slow substantial

tumble of glacial tongue
sweeping through
valleys reshaped

you arrived on your own epic time
patient and thorough
meltwater firn crevasse and all

lifting rocks on shifting plates
smoothing edges
and moving the very axes of my teeth

you soothed over rifts and fault lines
leaving me
newly minted

peaked and ridged
steep and crested
sloped and spurred

Hillsides lush
and summits glistening
I rush to a new dawn

but not without raw traces
of your tender era
scratched warmly on my every acre — Nancy Boutilier

Dreams, as we all know, are very queer things: some parts are presented with appalling vividness, with details worked up with the elaborate finish of jewellery, while others one gallops through, as it were, without noticing them at all, as, for instance, through space and time. Dreams seem to be spurred on not by reason but by desire, not by the head but by the heart, and yet what complicated tricks my reason has played sometimes in dreams, what utterly incomprehensible things happen to it! — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

At the group consciousness level, you're often dedicated to continuing social problems such as war, brutality, and religious persecution, which originated in ancestral enmities that have existed for thousands of years. But it also comes right down to daily living. Families insist that you adopt their viewpoint, hate whom they hate, and love whom they love. You have blind allegiance to a company that may be making weapons of destruction, a concept to which you're normally opposed, but you do it anyway because "it's my job." Some policemen and soldiers victimize their fellow human beings by behaving worse than the criminals or so-called enemies they abhor so much. Our inhumanity to our fellow human beings is often justified on the grounds of a group-consciousness mentality. Members of gangs or societies will behave in horrid ways, spurred on by a group or clan mentality. — Wayne W. Dyer

Even before President [Barack] Obama announced actions aimed at tightening controls on gun purchases, sales were up, partly in reaction to terrorist attacks in Paris and San Bernardino. Gun dealers say the president's initiatives have spurred sales. At the same time, polling shows more than two thirds of Americans support the president's proposals, including a majority of gun owners. — Rachel Martin

Robert held back in the press, letting others go after the rebels fleeing before the charge. Their orders were to slaughter anyone found in the streets to provoke a quick surrender, after which mercy would be granted to those left alive. He had seen death throughout his life, but the duel he'd had with Guy was the closest he'd come to ending someone's life and even then there had been rules imposed. There were no such boundaries here. The freedom to kill was a dizzying, precipitous feeling. But the veteran knights were pushing in behind him, forcing the issue. With a snarl of frustration at his own hesitation, Robert fixed on one man darting away down an alley and spurred his horse out of the crush in pursuit. — Robyn Young

All eyes are opened, or opening, to the rights of man. The general spread of the light of science has already laid open to every view the palpable truth that the mass of mankind has not been born with saddles on their backs, nor a favored few booted and spurred, ready to ride them legitimately, by the grace of God. These are grounds of hope for others. For ourselves, let the annual return of this day forever refresh our recollection of these rights, and an undiminished devotion to them. — Thomas Jefferson