Subdued Quotes & Sayings

Is there a place, save one the poet sees, A land of love, of liberty, and ease; Where labour wearies not, nor cares suppress Th' eternal flow of rustic happiness; Where no proud mansion frowns in awful state, Or keeps the sunshine from the cottage-gate; Where young and old, intent on pleasure, throng, And half man's life is holiday and song? Vain search for scenes like these! no view appears, By sighs unruffled or unstain'd by tears; Since vice the world subdued and waters drown'd, Auburn and Eden can no more be found. — George Crabbe

Satan had two conditions [to his plan]: the first was the denial of agency, and the second, that he would have the honor. In other words, something had to be in it for him. And thus he became the father of lies and selfishness. Taking up one's cross and following the Savior means overcoming selfishness; it is a commitment to serve others. Selfishness is one of the baser human traits, which must be subdued and overcome. We torture our souls when we focus on getting rather than giving. — James E. Faust

The passion for naming things is an odd human trait. It is strange that men always feel so much more at ease when they have put appellations on the things around them and that a wild, new region almost seems familiar and subdued once enough names have been used on it, even though in fact it is not changed in the slightest. Or, on second thought, it is perhaps not really strange. The urge to name must be as old as the human race, as old as speech which is one of the really fundamental characteristics by which we rise above the brutes, and thus a basic and essential part of the human spirit or soul. The naming fallacy is common enough even in science. Many a scientist claims to have explained some phenomenon when in truth all he has done is to give it a name. — George Gaylord Simpson

My demeanor isn't that of a woman enraged. To see me slumped, glassy-eyed, holding a sandwich someone has cut for me into four "manageable" pieces, a person might tell you I look much more like a woman subdued. — Koren Zailckas

The hostile multitudes are vast as spaceWhat chance is there that all should be subdued? Let but this angry mind be overthrownAnd every foe is then and there destroyed — Shantideva

Beauty in art is often nothing but ugliness subdued. — Jean Rostand

And we were taught to play golf. Golf epitomizes the tame world. On a golf course nature is neutered. The grass is clean, a lawn laundry that wipes away the mud, the insect, the bramble, nettle and thistle, an Eezy-wipe lawn where nothing of life, dirty and glorious, remains. Golf turns outdoors into indoors, a prefab mat of stultified grass, processed, pesticided, herbicided, the pseudo-green of formica sterility. Here, the grass is not singing. The wind cannot blow through it. Dumb expression, greenery made stupid, it hums a bland monotone in the key of the mono-minded. No word is emptier than a golf tee. No roots, it has no known etymology, it is verbal nail polish. Worldwide, golf is an arch act of enclosure, a commons fenced and subdued for the wealthy, trampling serf and seedling. The enemy of wildness, it is a demonstration of the absolute dominion of man over wild nature. — Jay Griffiths

Persuasion is a strong but subdued outrider. — Harold Bloom

Actual philosophers ... are commanders and law-givers: they say "thus it shall be!", it is they who determine the Wherefore and Whither of mankind, and they possess for this task the preliminary work of all the philosophical laborers, of all those who have subdued the past - they reach for the future with creative hand, and everything that is or has been becomes for them a means, an instrument, a hammer. — Friedrich Nietzsche

I was walking along the bank of a stream when I saw a mother otter with her cubs, a very endearing sight, I'm sure you'll agree. And even as I watched, the mother otter dived into the water and came up with a plump salmon, which she subdued and dragged onto a half submerged log. As she ate it, while of course it was still alive, the body split and I remember to this day the sweet pinkness of its roes as they spilled out, much to the delight of the baby otters, who scrambled over themselves to feed on the delicacy. One of nature's wonders, gentlemen. Mother and children dining upon mother and children. And that is when I first learned about evil. It is built into the very nature of the universe. Every world spins in pain. If there is any kind of supreme being, I told myself, it is up to all of us to become his moral superior. — Terry Pratchett

When people can't use you, they ridicule what you represent. I was lucky that I understood that, because when one does not understand that, it is very easy to be broken and to be subdued. — Wangari Maathai

If he was silent I could be silent too. Indeed, I could very well do with a little rest in this subdued, frightened-to-death rocking chair, before I drove to wherever the beast's lair was - and then pulled the pistol's foreskin back, and then enjoyed the orgasm of the crushed trigger. — Vladimir Nabokov

Six years later the lead scientist, pharmacologist Kenneth Blum, published a much more subdued assessment: Unfortunately it was erroneously reported that [we] had found the "alcoholism gene," implying that there was a one-to-one relation between a gene and a specific behavior. Such misinterpretations are common - readers may recall accounts of an "obesity gene," or a "personality gene." Needless to say, there is no such thing as a specific gene for alcoholism, obesity, or a particular type of personality. ... Rather the issue at hand is to understand how certain genes and behavioral traits are connected. — Gabor Mate

I like B. Wooster the way he is. Lay off him, I say. Don't try to change him, or you may lose the flavour. Even when we were merely affianced, I recalled, this woman had dashed the mystery thriller from my hand, instructing me to read instead a perfectly frightful thing by a bird called Tolstoy. At the thought of what horrors might ensue after the clergyman had done his stuff and she had a legal right to bring my grey hairs in sorrow to the grave, the imagination boggled. It was a subdued and apprehensive Bertram Wooster who some moments later reached for the hat and light overcoat and went off to the Savoy to shove food into the Trotters. The — P.G. Wodehouse

Serpent, I say again!' repeated the Pigeon, but in a more subdued tone, and added with a kind of sob, 'I've tried every way, and nothing seems to suit them!' 'I haven't the least idea what you're talking — Lewis Carroll

Illium, his expression subdued as it had been for too many days, turned to her. "Mind if I have a go?"
"Kick his ass."
Stripping off his shirt and boots, Illium held out his hand for one of Venom's blades. Lips curving, Venom passed it over. "Sure you can handle me, pretty, pretty Bluebell?"
"Did I ever tell you about my snakeskin boots?" A savage grin, and she knew Venom was about to bear the brunt of whatever haunted the blue-winged angel.
Venom swirled his blade in hand. "I do think I need some new feathers for my pillow. — Nalini Singh

Free nations of the world cannot allow Taiwan, a beacon of democracy, to be subdued by an authoritarian China. — Nick Lampson

Sanity consists in not being subdued by your means. Fancy prices are paid for position, and for the culture of talent, but to thegrand interests, superficial success is of no account. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

Love is a great thing, yea, a great and thorough good.
By itself it makes that which is heavy light;
and it bears evenly all that is uneven.
It carries a burden which is no burden;
it will not be kept back by anything low and mean;
It desires to be free from all wordly affections,
and not to be entangled by any outward prosperity,
or by any adversity subdued.
Love feels no burden, thinks nothing of trouble,
attempts what is above its strength,
pleads no excuse of impossibility.
It is therefore able to undertake all things,
and it completes many things and warrants them to take effect,
where he who does not love would faint and lie down.
Though weary, it is not tired;
though pressed it is not straightened;
though alarmed, it is not confounded;
but as a living flame it forces itself upwards and securely passes through all.
Love is active and sincere, courageous, patient, faithful, prudent, and manly. — Thomas A Kempis

If I seem detached or distant, it's because I think this is a more exact reproduction of life, where you hide as much as you show. When I see a scene in which feelings get loudly exteriorized, I say to myself, 'Well, at least this never happens to me.' I very rarely go through this type of expression. Most of the time things are hidden or at least much more subdued. — Isabelle Huppert

Man Thinking must not be subdued by his instruments. Books are for the scholar's idle times. When he can read God directly, the hour is too precious to be wasted in other men's transcripts of their readings. — Ralph Waldo Emerson

Homo sapiens! The name itself was an irony. They had not been wise at all, but incredibly stupid. Lords of the Earth with their great gray brains, their thinking minds had placed them above all other forms of life. Yet it had not been thought that compelled them to act, but emotion. From the dawn of their evolution they had killed, and conquered, and subdued. They had committed atrocities on others of their kind, ravaged the land, polluted and destroyed, left millions to starve in Third World countries, and finished it all with a nuclear holocaust. The mutants were right. Intelligent creatures did not commit genocide, or murder the environment on which they were dependent. — Louise Lawrence

While the official productivity data look impressive, alternative measures that are equally reasonable show a much more subdued picture. — Jan Hatzius

Penance to be sure must be used as a tool, in due times and places, as need may be. If the flesh, being too strong, kicks against the spirit, penance takes the rod of discipline, and fast, and the cilice of many buds, and mighty vigils; and places burdens enough on the flesh, that it may be more subdued. But if the body is weak, fallen into illness, the rule of discretion does not approve of such a method. — St. Catherine Of Siena

I read and feel that same compulsion; the desire to possess what he has written, which can only be subdued by writing something myself. — Patti Smith

What does it mean that thirty thousand men, not athletes but rather weak and ordinary people, have subdued two hundred million vigorous, clever, capable, and freedom-loving people? Do not the figures make it clear that it is not the English who have enslaved the Indians, but the Indians who have enslaved themselves? — Leo Tolstoy

After we have been subdued by the law and tell the Lord that we cannot fulfill His requirements, that we simply cannot be holy as God is or perfect as the Father is, the Lord will say, "Simply open and receive Me. Let Me come into you and fulfill these requirements for you. I want to be your holiness and your perfection." We cannot be holy, but we can be sanctified. Likewise, we cannot be perfect, but we can be perfected. God's desire is to come into us to be our life and our person. In this way, He becomes one with us, and we become one with Him. Then as He lives in us, we live Him. This is the basic principle of the divine revelation in the Bible. — Witness Lee

The Western hero, subdued by kisses and the mere tease of rope. — Rachel Kramer Bussel

HIs slower mind could not keep pace with her swift reactions; his emotions, not easily aroused, were still less easily subdued. Always he felt himself left far behind her, dull, clumsy, insensitive, too fond, too gross, too awkward. — Winifred Holtby

Some Kentucky fans are a little more subdued. — Ashley Judd

It carries a burden which is no burden; it will not be kept back by anything low and mean; it desires to be free from all wordly affections, and not to be entangled by any outward prosperity, or by any adversity subdued. — Thomas A Kempis

As I write, I control my anxiety and anguish thanks to the invaluable aid of irony and humor. But every night I am subdued by an anxiety that knows no irony, and I must wait until the next day to rediscover the blend of anguish and humor that characterizes my writing and that generates my style. — Enrique Vila-Matas

There is not a single penal institution or reformatory in the United States where men are not tortured "to be made good," by means of the blackjack, the club, the straightjacket, the water-cure, the "humming bird" (an electrical contrivance run along the human body), the solitary, the bullring, and starvation diet. In these institutions his will is broken, his soul degraded, his spirit subdued by the deadly monotony and routine of prison life. — Emma Goldman

As they rolled over the marshes before Venice, he fell back in his seat, windburnt and exhausted, and noticed that the bottle of water, but for its slight and elegant blue tint, was the smoothest, clearest, and most transparent thing he had ever seen. All that was reflected in it was sharp, subdued, and calm. The fields outside, beyond the reeds; the reeds themselves, waving green and yellow; the water, shockingly blue in north light, were clarified, compressed, and preserved within the lens. And if bottles of mineral water could pacify the light of mountains, fields, and the sea, to what painful mysteries would the lens of beauty be opaque? Even death, Alessandro thought, would yield to beauty - if not in fact then in explanation - for the likeness of every great question could be found in forms as simple as songs, and there, if not explicable, they were at least perfectly apprehensible. — Mark Helprin

For me, when I grew up playing music, I played music in church and people were shouting and having a big time, and church wasn't something where it was subdued. If you played something, you brought it to church with you. — Randy Owen

When a man's pride is subdued it's like the sides of Mount Aetna. It was terrible during the eruption, but when that is over and the lava is turned into soil, there are vineyards and olive trees which grow up to the top. — Henry Ward Beecher

Laws are partly formed for the sake of good men, in order to instruct them how they may live on friendly terms with one another, and partly for the sake of those who refuse to be instructed, whose spirit cannot be subdued, or softened, or hindered from plunging into evil. — Plato

A general dissolution of principles and manners will more surely overthrow the liberties of America than the whole force of the common enemy. While the people are virtuous they cannot be subdued; but when once they lose their virtue then will be ready to surrender their liberties to the first external or internal invader. — Samuel Adams

Subdued. Maybe that was what depression dipped in false cheer looked like. — Alessandra Torre

Jefferson's love of control was evident when he was at home. He was precise and demanding about his horses. When he was younger and his mount was brought to him, he would use a white cambric handkerchief to brush the horse's shoulders.63 If there were dust, the horse was returned to the stables. Only the perfect would suffice. His horses were sources of immense pleasure, but he also disliked animals with wills of their own, and his mask of equanimity could slip occasionally when it came to his horses. "The only impatience of temper he ever exhibited was with his horse, which he subdued to his will by a fearless application of the whip on the slightest manifestation of restiveness," said a grandson.64 — Jon Meacham

The reaches opened before us and closed behind, as if the forest had stepped leisurely across the water to bar the way for our return. We penetrated deeper and deeper into the heart of darkness. It was very quiet there. At night sometimes the roll of drums behind the curtain of trees would run up the river and remain sustained faintly, as if hovering in the air high over our heads, till the first break of day. Whether it meant war, peace, or prayer we could not tell. The dawns were heralded by the descent of a chill stillness; the wood-cutters slept, their fires burned low; the snapping of a twig would make you start. We were wanderers on a prehistoric earth, on an earth that wore the aspect of an unknown planet. We could have fancied ourselves the first of men taking possession of an accursed inheritance, to be subdued at the cost of profound anguish and of excessive toil. — Joseph Conrad

In a world where success is the measure and justification of all things the figure of Him who was sentenced and crucified remains a stranger and is at best the object of pity. The world will allow itself to be subdued only by success. It is not ideas or opinions which decide, but deeds. Success alone justifies wrongs done ... With a frankness and off-handedness which no other earthly power could permit itself, history appeals in its own cause to the dictum that the end justifies the means ... The figure of the Crucified invalidates all thought that takes success for its standard. — Dietrich Bonhoeffer

mean anything." She seemed subdued, sad. — Peter Benchley

As for those who seek the transcendental Reality, without name, without form, contemplating the Unmanifested, beyond the reach of thought and of feeling, 4 with their senses subdued and mind serene and striving for the good of all beings, they too will verily come unto me. — Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa

If you put sexual attraction on a scale of one to ten, where ten equals "you can't keep your hands off each other,"five equals "you can take it or leave it," and one equals "repulsed," to support a vibrant relationship, it should be at least a seven, preferably an eight, nine, or ten. With work, you might raise the attraction one notch, but because there is so much biochemistry involved in sexual attraction, it's hard to do much more than that. So if a sexual attraction doesn't evolve, remember, it's not anyone's fault and it's just the what is of your pairing, and you might make better friends than lovers.

Sexual attraction doesn't have to be instantaneous on first meeting, but it must eventually flower because it provides a basic glue for successful conjugal union. If we're not sexually alive to our beloved, it often leads to a subdued relationship, loneliness, affairs, or lots of fantasies. — Charlotte Kasl

There are moments when a man's imagination, so easily subdued to what it lives in, suddenly rises above its daily level, and surveys the long windings of destiny. — Edith Wharton

A kind of joyous hysteria moved into the room, everything flying before the wind, vehicles outside getting dented to hell, the crowd sweaty and the smells of aftershave, manure, clothes dried on the line, your money's worth of perfume, smoke, booze; the music subdued by the shout and babble through the bass hammer could be felt through the soles of the feet, shooting up the channels of legs to the body fork, center of everything. It is the kind of Saturday night that torches your life for a few hours, makes it seem like something is happening. — Annie Proulx

But he did not say a thing. Of late, almost as if he had been brought into line with the way people now spoke of the Sikhs, he had come to dislike the sound of his dissenting voice. It made him feel like a bore and an activist; and, like many people who try to fight an emerging status quo, no matter how ugly it is, he felt himself subdued, not by arguments, but by its casual tyranny. It is easier to fight the knowing bigot than it is to fight prejudice in the mouth of a child or the throwaway remark of a society lady. — Aatish Taseer

Dramatic experience is not logical; it may be subdued to the kind of coherence that we indicate when we speak, in criticism, of form. — Allen Tate

Feeling my own humiliation in my heart like the sharp prick of a needle. — Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Men and women, inspired by faith in man's dignity, goaded by conviction in man's responsibility, labored that this land might be a better home for those who followed them. Because every American generation attacked its problems with fresh vigor, we have peopled a continent, subdued its prairies and wilderness, tamed its rivers and devoted its resources to the betterment of those who dwell in it. — Dwight D. Eisenhower

Stolid pack-animals are much more fit for carrying loads than thoroughbred horses: who ever subdued their noble speed with a heavy burden? — Seneca.

Again, there are multitudes who are quite ready for Christ to justify them, but not to sanctify. Some kind, some degree, of sanctification they will tolerate, but to be sanctified wholly,their "whole spirit and soul and body" (1 Thess. 5:23), they have no relish for. For their hearts to be sanctified, for pride and covetousness to be subdued, would be too much like the plucking out of a right eye. For the constant mortification of all their members they have no taste. For Christ to come to them as Refiner, to burn up their lusts, consume their dross, to dissolve utterly their old frame of nature, to melt their souls, so as to make them run in a new mould, they like not. To deny self utterly, and take up their cross daily, is a task from which they shrink with abhorrence. — Arthur W. Pink

He stalked closer, his movements feline, those violet eyes turning subdued-lethal. "You're welcome, you know."
"For saving you when asked." I stiffened. " I didn't ask for anything. — Sarah J. Maas

Virtue becomes unhealthy if it is not softened by some misdemeanors, and faith quickly becomes cruel if is not subdued by certain doubts. — Amin Maalouf

Brave is the lion tamer, brave is the world subduer, but braver is the one who has subdued himself. — Johann Gottfried Herder

It sometimes seems to me that some of our Western partners do not want Russia to fully recover. They would like Russia to be in a subdued state, and they want Russian resources to be used for the benefit of the U.S. economy. — Mikhail Gorbachev

Cursed in earth and subdued by death, man found himself beset by time, and his instincts put to the test. Only then, he realized that with love he could survive, and that for a certain purpose he would toil. For those whom my love can not immune from death, are dedicated these paintings, in the hope they may express in drawing the reality of a resonant mind. — Ala Bashir

These European White Men, then, with civilization in their blood and in their destiny, crossed the Atlantic and set up a new civilization on a bleak and rock bound coast. It was the White Men who drove north to Alaska and west to California; the men who opened up the tropics and subdued the Arctics; the men who mastered the African Veldts; the men who peopled Australia and seized the gates of the world at Suez, Gibraltar and Panama. — Ben Klassen

If I could go back to a point in history to try to get things to come out differently, I would go back and tell moses to go up the mountain again and get the other tablet. Because the Ten Commandments just tell us what we are supped to do with one another, not a word about our relationship to the earth. Genesis starts with these commands: multiply, replenish the earth, and subdue it. We have multiplied very well, we have replenished our populations very well, we have subdued it all too well, and we don't have any other instruction. — David Brower

Lower oil prices won't, by themselves, topple the mullahs in Iran. But it's significant that, historically, when oil prices have been low, Iranian reformers have been ascendant and radicals relatively subdued, and vice versa when prices have been high. — James Surowiecki

Duiri Tal, a small lake, lies cradled on the hill above Okhimath, at a height of 8,000 feet. It was a favourite spot of one of Garhwal's earliest British Commissioners, J.H. Batten, whose administration continued for twenty years (1836-56). He wrote: The day I reached there, it was snowing and young trees were laid prostrate under the weight of snow; the lake was frozen over to a depth of about two inches. There was no human habitation, and the place looked a veritable wilderness. The next morning when the sun appeared, the Chaukhamba and many other peaks extending as far as Kedarnath seemed covered with a new quilt of snow, as if close at hand. The whole scene was so exquisite that one could not tire of gazing at it for hours. I think a person who has a subdued settled despair in his mind would all of a sudden feel a kind of bounding and exalting cheerfulness which will be imparted to his frame by the atmosphere of Duiri Tal. This — Ruskin Bond

Every temptation that is resisted, every evil thought that is curbed, every desire that is subdued, every bitter word that is withheld, every noble aspiration that is encouraged, every sublime thought that is cultivated, adds to the development of will-force, good character, and attainment of eternal bliss and immortality. — Sivananda

After the island of Sebu follow immediately the island of Mindanao, an island of more than three hundred leguas in circumference, and Jolo, which is small. Lower down is the island of Borneo, a very large island, more than five hundred leguas in circumference. All of these islands are densely populated, although that of Borneo is not subdued. Neither is that of Mindanao in entirety, but only the river of Botuan, Dapitan, and the province and coast of Caragan. — Antonio De Morga

We must free the slaves or be ourselves subdued. — Abraham Lincoln

Outside the rain finally began to fall, surging in fits and starts. "I love the way it rains here," he told her. "It reminds me that some forces of nature can never be entirely subdued. They are eternal, which is a far better thing to be than immortal. — Neal Shusterman

And then, of course, most potters, they go in for earth tones and subdued things, and I like color. — Beatrice Wood

He can see us, said the angel who had been gesturing so pointedly. His voice was subdued but seemed to reach my ears effortlessly and gently. — Anne Rice

If I ever score against Spurs, I won't celebrate. Even if it's the best goal in the world, I'll keep it subdued. It's a respect thing. The fans were brilliant towards me; I'll be playing against my friends and I can't forget that. — Jermain Defoe

Money is the last enemy that shall never be subdued. While there is flesh there is money or the want of money, but money is always on the brain so long as there is a brain in reasonable order. — Samuel Butler

Tracy Morgan is subdued. I'm cool. I'm chilled out. — Tracy Morgan

My life is one long daily, hourly record of answered prayer. For physical health, for mental overstrain, for guidance given marvelously, for errors and dangers averted, for enmity to the Gospel subdued, for food provided at the exact hour needed, for everything that goes to make up life and my poor service. I can testify, with a full and often wonder-stricken awe, that I believe God answers prayer. — Mary Slessor

Here, he's resting on the examining table. Pulse seventy-two. Here, he grabs the nurse's head and pulls her down to him. Here, he is subdued by the attendant. He didn't resist, by the way, though the attendant dislocated his shoulder. Do you notice the strange thing? His pulse never got over eighty-five. Even when he tore out her tongue. — Thomas Harris

Frequently, beauty is playful like dancing sunlight, it cannot be predicted, and in the most unlikely scene or situation can suddenly emerge. This spontaneity and playfulness often subverts our self-importance and throws our plans and intentions into disarray. Without intending it, we find ourselves coming alive with a sense of celebration and delight. The pedestrian sequence of a working day breaks, a new door opens and the heart recognizes the silent majesty of the ordinary. The things we never notice, like health, friends and love, emerge from their subdued presence and stand out in their true radiance as gifts we could never have earned or achieved. Beauty — John O'Donohue

My galligaskins, that have long withstood The winter's fury, and encroaching frosts, By time subdued (what will not time subdue!), A horrid chasm disclosed. — John Phillips

The whole of society in Washington is to some degree political. It is like no other capital city known to me, in that political thinking, the whole business, technical and personal, of politics, is not diluted by an equal interest in art, industry, amusement, anything you like. I don't meant that these are non-existent in Washington
only that they are subdued to the ruling passion. — Storm Jameson

He did the same in the morning and didn't mind that Steel struggled against him. Steel needed to be subdued first, but he never said no, and he always came.

Maybe Steel thought he was being punished.

Maybe he thought the whipping was forgiven. — Aleksandr Voinov

Since Europe is dependent on imports of energy and most of its raw materials, it can be subdued, if not quite conquered, without all those nuclear weapons the Soviets have aimed at it simply through the shipping routes and raw materials they control. — Barbara Amiel

Will tossed the bloody cloth aside. "And you wonder why we aren't friends."
"I just wondered," Gabriel said, in more subdued voice, "if perhaps you have ever had enough."
"Enough of what?"
"Enough of behaving as you do."
Will crossed his arms over his chest. His eyes glistening dangerously. "Oh, I can never get enough," he said. "Which, incidentally, is what your sister said to me when-"
The carriage door flew open. A hand shot out, grabbed Will by the back of his shirt, and hauled him inside. — Cassandra Clare

I'm quite subdued, believe it or not. I switch it on for the camera. — Cilla Black

Clothing gave you comfort, a sense of security and individuality, or just something to hide within. By removing it from the equation, by stripping a person down to their bare essence, it keeps you off guard, humbled and subdued — Johnny Stone

The young (Somali) women were very inquisitive as to European customs, and listened attentively to descriptions of the manners, education, and clothes of white ladies, as if out to complete their strategic education with the knowledge of how the males of an alien race were conquered and subdued. — Karen Blixen

The potency of prayer hath subdued the strength of fire; it hath bridled the rage of lions, hushed anarchy to rest, extinguished wars, appeased the elements, expelled demons, burst the chains of death, expanded the gates of heaven, assuaged diseases, repelled frauds, rescued cities from destruction, stayed the sun in its course, and arrested the progress of the thunderbolt. — John Chrysostom

There are two ways of defending a castle; one by shutting yourself up in it, and guarding every loop-hole; the other by making it an open centre of operations from which all the surrounding country may be subdued. Is not the last the truest safety? — Phillips Brooks

Hope? Hope is not the absence of tragedy, my friend. It is the conviction that tragedy can be endured. Hope is the spark in you that is not subdued in the face of the vast and callous indifference of the universe. Hope is that which is not shattered by hardship. Hope is the urge to fight what is wrong even when you know it will destroy you. Hope is the decision to love and need someone knowing that they will one day die. For me to promise that there are no obstacles would be the cruelest lie I could possibly tell. That lie is not hope. Hope is the will which needs no lies. — Travis Beacham

Sleep pressed upon him with an urgency that became resistless. And April Bell was calling to him. Her voice came clearly to him, above all the subdued murmur of traffic noises. It was a ringing golden chime, more penetrating than the occasional beep of a driver's horn or the far clamor of a streetcar. It shimmered out of the dark, in waves of pure light as green as her malachite eyes. Then he thought he could see her, somehow, far across the slumberous town. Only she wasn't a woman. — Jack Williamson

They were talking more distantly than if they were strangers who had just met, for if they had been he would have been interested in her just because of that, and curious, but their common past was a wall of indifference between them. Kitty knew too well that she had done nothing to beget her father's affection, he had never counted in the house and had been taken for granted, the bread-winner who was a little despised because he could provide no more luxuriously for his family; but she had taken for granted that he loved her just because he was her father, and it was a shock to discover that his heart was empty of feeling for her. She had known that they were all bored by him, but it had never occurred to her that he was equally bored by them. He was as ever kind and subdued, but the sad perspicacity which she had learnt in suffering suggested to her that, though he probably never acknowledged it to himself and never would, in his heart he disliked her. — W. Somerset Maugham

Man has subdued the world, but woman has subdued man. Mind and muscle have won his victories; love and loveliness have gained hers. No monarch has been so great, no peasant so lowly, that he has not been glad to lay his best at the feet of a woman. — Mary Abigail Dodge

He's a funny one," said Ida. "Here's how he sound." She pursed her lips and, expertly, imitated the red-winged blackbird's call: not the liquid piping of the wood thrush, which dipped down into the dry tchh tchh tchh of the cricket's birr and up again in delerious, sobbing trills; not the clear, three-note whistle of the chickadee or even the blue jay's rough cry, which was like a rusty gate creaking. This was an abrupt, whirring, unfamiliar cry, a scream of warning -congeree!- which choked itself off on a subdued, fluting note. — Donna Tartt

The zeal and virtue of Ali were never outstripped by any recent proselyte. He united the qualifications of a poet, a soldier, and a saint; his wisdom still breathes in a collection of moral and religious sayings; and every antagonist, in the combats of the tongue or of the sword, was subdued by his eloquence and valour. From the first hour of his mission to the last rites of his funeral, the apostle was never forsaken by a generous friend, whom he delighted to name his brother, his vicegerent, and the faithful Aaron of a second Moses. — Edward Gibbon

The chronic kicker, even the most violent critic, will frequently soften and be subdued in the presence of a patient, sympathetic listener - a listener who will be silent while the irate fault-finder dilates like a king cobra and spews the poison out of his system. — Dale Carnegie

Civilization has been a continuous struggle of the individual or of groups of individuals against the State and even against "society," that is, against the majority subdued and hypnotized by the State and State worship. — Emma Goldman

We [Muslims] have to be above you. You [Americans] have to be subdued. No regrets. No remorse. — Zacarias Moussaoui

I soon began to dream ... I heard subdued sobs, as if a number of people were weeping ... I left my bed and wandered downstairs ... There I met with a sickening surprise. Before me was a catafalque, on which rested a corpse wrapped in funeral vestments. Around it were stationed soldiers who were acting as guards; and there was a throng of people, gazing mournfully upon the corpse, whose face was covered, others weeping pitifully. 'Who is dead in the White House?' I demanded of one of the soldiers, 'The President,' was his answer; 'he was killed by an assassin.' — Abraham Lincoln

At that time the sons of God will be fully manifested on the earth. Widespread spiritual warfare will result with the Sons of God doing battle with Satan and company, the non-Christian nations of this world will also be defeated. Once the earth has been subdued. Jesus will come back to earth and be given the Kingdom that has been won for Him by this manchild company. — Bill Hamon

I examined it cautiously. On the opposite side of the chain from the wolf, there now hung a brilliant heart-shaped crystal. It was cut in a million facets, so that even in the subdued light shining from the lamp, it sparkled. I inhaled in a low gasp ... "
"But I thought it was a good representation,' he continued. 'It's hard and cold.' He laughed. 'And it throws rainbows in the sunlight.'
'You forgot the most important similarity,' I murmured. 'It's beautiful.'
'My heart is just as silent,' he mused. 'And it, too, is yours. — Stephenie Meyer

The more humble, needy, and subdued you are before Allah, the closer you will be to Him. — Ibn Taymiyyah

You have a terrible beauty that scares me - a fierce defiance that won't be subdued - not that i want to tame you - I don't - I like to look ... — John Geddes

Them. We were the persons who made this good beginning, and it was not until two years later, when we had made the conquest, and introduced good morals and better manners among the inhabitants, that the pious Franciscan brothers arrived, and three or four years after the virtuous monks of the Dominican order, who further continued the good work, and spread Christianity through the country. The first part of the work, however, next to the Almighty, was done by us, the true Conquistadores, who subdued the country, and by the Brothers of Charity, who accompanied — Bernal Diaz Del Castillo

A strangely reflective, even melancholy day. Is that because, unlike our cousins in the northern hemisphere, Easter is not associated with the energy and vitality of spring but with the more subdued spirit of autumn? — Hugh Mackay