dynamic
toggle menu
menu
vocabulary
1000+ books

preclude
in a sentence

show 105 more with this conextual meaning
  • Her worries were supposed to preclude any real problem.†   (source)
  • Wasn't there some sort of manly code that precluded discussions like this—discussions about feelings?†   (source)
  • One wrong word, one poorly constructed phrase, and he might destroy her sense of empathy, or preclude her from ever learning how to communicate with her mind, or inhibit her own sense of pain, so she would not immediately notice when she was injured.†   (source)
  • At about the same time, Knox suffered an accident which, like Greene's stiff knee, might have precluded service as an officer.†   (source)
  • In the realm of totalitarian kitsch, all answers are given in advance and preclude any questions.†   (source)
  • The priest made a gesture of appeasement, a raised hand that precluded any need for further explanation.†   (source)
  • Such an arrangement wouldn't preclude a cash bribe.†   (source)
  • Lyndon Johnson returned the favor by issuing an executive order precluding Hoover from compulsory retirement, thus allowing the director to remain in charge of the FBI until his death in 1972 at the age of seventy-seven.†   (source)
  • Certain he could not stand against her, Attolia stepped back, forgetting that being defenseless didn't preclude attack.†   (source)
  • It occurred to me that the business of surviving precluded a great many things, exploring and falling in love not least among them.†   (source)
  • His work in Medusa precluded any sustained career in the State Department.†   (source)
  • Nicolo asked skeptically, in the way that people of suppressed dreams often preclude their own possibilities.†   (source)
  • It sounded like some sort of monstrous corruption that precluded the possibility of wondering whether anyone could mean it; he wondered only what was the point of uttering it.†   (source)
  • While the plane had heaters to preclude this, it is possible the heaters were not activated.†   (source)
  • He was losing his voice and the noise of the crowd precluded any chance or need of hearing him.†   (source)
  • The nature of the Service precluded elaborate farewells and the presentation of gold watches, but even by these standards Leamas' departure seemed abrupt.†   (source)
  • The possibility of local deposits, of the volcanic-pipe variety or alluvial, was not precluded.†   (source)
  • —accomplished with an instantaneousness so complete as to preclude even the onset of pain.†   (source)
  • The capitalistic basis of the great values of Western culture will preclude solution of the world's problems.†   (source)
  • Miss Moody, with a fervent frown which precluded interruption, sang in soft tremolo as she rubbed the linedup children with "Sweet Dreams."†   (source)
  • Don't rule out working with your hands. It does not preclude using your head.   (source)
  • Of course, our failures are a consequence of many factors, but possibly one of the most important is the fact that society operates on the theory that specialization is the key to success, not realizing that specialization precludes comprehensive thinking.   (source)
  • But for the moment his sense of relief was so great as to preclude all other feelings.   (source)
  • I use the word "enjoy" in two distinct senses, precluding, of course, the obsolete third.†   (source)
  • Normally, their history precludes Lincoln from talking about death with Mary present.†   (source)
  • Solomon, doctor-patient confidentiality precludes me from discussing your brother's condition, and I've already said too much by admitting he is my patient.†   (source)
  • There were political realities there, then and now, that precluded blind faith, that discouraged one from thinking that everything, always, would work out fairly and equitably.†   (source)
  • The scholarship would have obligated me to spend four years in military service after I finished college, precluding my chances to go on to medical school.†   (source)
  • Wisdom precludes boldness.†   (source)
  • — standing over the twisted and smashed thing in the driveway, striking it again and again with something that looked like a caveman's club ...that turned his fear to a bright, silvery panic that almost precluded thought.†   (source)
  • Or she: nothing precludes that.†   (source)
  • According to my uncle, they were originally to meet at the airport but the Crown governor's reception line precluded it.†   (source)
  • A simple act of faith on Alex's part could have made all the difference, but Alex could not find it within himself to provide it; his own bitterness precluded that particular charity.†   (source)
  • He could not stay away for three hours, not after his conversation with Undersecretary of State Edward McAllister; appearances precluded such an absence.†   (source)
  • The veneer of sophistication and the pursuit of security were valued over a smoldering, wandering first-rate mind of unsure direction, especially a mind inside a head of unkempt hair and a body dressed in clothes that were cheap imitations of J. Press and Brooks Brothers, which appeared even worse because his bank account precluded any additional expenses for alterations and few discount stores carried his size.†   (source)
  • None of them precludes the others.†   (source)
  • Instead of one shell, he now had the full complement of nine in addition to a silencer that precluded disturbing the revered dead in a revered mausoleum.†   (source)
  • Anger precludes civility?†   (source)
  • Since self-interest dominated while actual planning was precluded, my thoughts tooled their way into a more general groove.†   (source)
  • While my desolation at this point precluded any such thing as a grin, Sophie did quite easily manage to cool my frenzy.†   (source)
  • It was a situation of which they were both aware; thus Leamas had fiercely rejecte4 a human relationship with Peters, for his pride precluded it.†   (source)
  • I never saw a single hooker—the conventional neighborhood and the tired and baggy clientele precluded even the idea of any such sport—but there were, this special evening, two smiling nuns who bore down on Sophie and me with some kind of rattling tin-plated chalice and a murmured plea for charity, in the name of the Sisters of St. Joseph.†   (source)
  • In closing, let me add that I trust your future life will be more productive of happiness, than has been the recent past; and that the evening of your life will bring with it a serenity, which the vain and tempestuous passions of youth so often unfortunately, if not disastrously, preclude.†   (source)
  • A failing out doesn't preclude a later rapprochement, his mind retorted with a kind of grave and implacable calm.†   (source)
  • Each kept occasional notes on the journey, and while Jefferson showed more interest in "practical things," where Adams was inclined to remark on the historical or literary associations of the places they saw, this does not necessarily preclude a comparable interest in most everything encountered.†   (source)
  • The fact that they were of like mind on most matters military and political, and got along well, seemed to preclude the friction and jealousies between the Royal Navy and the army frequently endemic to such joint operations.†   (source)
  • Five hundred nuclear explosions at the test site, which is southwest of the city, and even when they stopped testing in the atmosphere, the mine shafts they dug for underground detonations were not deep enough to preclude the venting of dangerous levels of radiation.†   (source)
  • And we see two things: schizophrenia would have destroyed it, and a successful resolution of its problem would preclude vengeance.†   (source)
  • Exactly what, was not known, since even at that time he was a secret man who could have been either thirty-five or fifty, with something in his glance coldly and violently fanatical and a little crazed, precluding questioning, curiosity.†   (source)
  • It was not her vanity that precluded Flo Hutter as a rival.†   (source)
  • After a long day's ride the business of eating precluded conversation.†   (source)
  • Her intense interest precluded any humor at this moment.†   (source)
  • The attachment he felt to Anna precluded in his heart every need of intimate relations with others.†   (source)
  • The regret that I felt for this, while I lingered alone to dream for a little by myself, made me suffer so acutely that, in order not to feel it, my mind of its own accord, by a sort of inhibition in the instant of pain, ceased entirely to think of verse-making, of fiction, of the poetic future on which my want of talent precluded me from counting.†   (source)
  • A vigorous, resolute Church Reader, in a frock-coat, was reading something in a loud voice with an expression that precluded any contradiction.†   (source)
  • At any time this work called for a clearness of mind that precluded anxiety and worry; but under the present circumstances it required all her vigor and obstinate tenacity to pin her attention upon her task.†   (source)
  • Nevertheless, that part of it slipped from his mind, and the vague, somehow pleasurable impression of the girl persisted until the serious and thrilling business of choosing horse and gun precluded all else.†   (source)
  • Joachim never spoke of tittering Marusya, which therefore precluded Hans Castorp from mentioning Clavdia Chauchat.†   (source)
  • He had fallen seriously ill, and his illness precluded his appearance in society, and even at business, for over a month.†   (source)
  • She could have waited until four if necessary, but something in his manner had precluded that—something distant and evasive.†   (source)
  • But that overdeveloped, superhuman spirit of defense in him precluded suicide or the inviting of an enemy's bullet.†   (source)
  • Mrs. Fisher was not a woman who talked of herself without cause, and the practice of direct speech, far from precluding in her an occasional resort to circuitous methods, served rather, at crucial moments, the purpose of the juggler's chatter while he shifts the contents of his sleeves.†   (source)
  • Our relationship, or my relationship to her, precluded any social element; indeed I must say its beginnings lie in darkness.†   (source)
  • For an instant he was astounded to see Lassiter stunned; then his own passionate eagerness to unbosom himself, to tell the wonderful story, precluded any other thought.†   (source)
  • A surplus of waiters precluded the stir and bustle that even a few busy men can create; over the scene as its form of animation brooded an air of waiting for something, for the dance, the night, the balance of forces which kept it stable, to cease.†   (source)
  • I recollect, Lady Dedlock, that you certainly referred to the girl, but that was before we came to our arrangement, and both the letter and the spirit of our arrangement altogether precluded any action on your part founded upon my discovery.†   (source)
  • But Prince Vasili interrupted him in the special deep cooing tone, precluding the possibility of interrupting his speech, which he used in extreme cases when special persuasion was needed.†   (source)
  • And his agitation precluded further speech; he advanced hastily to the entrance, where I made way for him to pass.†   (source)
  • Having, by this open declaration of his feelings, quite precluded himself from offering Nicholas any cautious worldly advice (which had been his first intention), Mr Noggs went straight to the point.†   (source)
  • "Jasper," returned Pathfinder simply, but with a dignity that precluded further remarks at the moment, "we will talk of the Sergeant's funeral and of our own departure from this island.†   (source)
  • These convictions must unquestionably have their own pain, and severe was its kind; but they precluded that pain which Lady Russell would suffer in entering the house again, and returning through the well-known apartments.†   (source)
  • I could find, indeed, but one vulnerable point, and that, lying in a personal peculiarity, arising, perhaps, from constitutional disease, would have been spared by any antagonist less at his wit's end than myself;—my rival had a weakness in the faucal or guttural organs, which precluded him from raising his voice at any time above a very low whisper.†   (source)
  • The facility with which journals can be established induces a multitude of individuals to take a part in them; but as the extent of competition precludes the possibility of considerable profit, the most distinguished classes of society are rarely led to engage in these undertakings.†   (source)
  • An union of a different tendency, and precluding the possibility of the other, was soon to be formed in their family.†   (source)
  • Miss Temple had always something of serenity in her air, of state in her mien, of refined propriety in her language, which precluded deviation into the ardent, the excited, the eager: something which chastened the pleasure of those who looked on her and listened to her, by a controlling sense of awe; and such was my feeling now: but as to Helen Burns, I was struck with wonder.†   (source)
  • Well, the poison brings on a cough, the cough an inflammation of the lungs, or some other complaint catalogued in the book of science, which, however, by no means precludes it from being decidedly mortal; and if it were not, would be sure to become so, thanks to the remedies applied by foolish doctors, who are generally bad chemists, and which will act in favor of or against the malady, as you please; and then there is a human being killed according to all the rules of art and skill, and of whom justice learns nothing, as was said by a terrible chemist of my acquaintance, the worthy Abbe Adelmonte of Taormina, in Sicily, who has studied these national phenomena very profoundly.†   (source)
  • After that he was downtown all day long, about the square, untalkative, dirty, with that furious and preclusive expression about the eyes which the people took for insanity: that quality of outworn violence like a scent, an odor; that fanaticism like a fading and almost extinct ember, of some kind of twofisted evangelism which had been one quarter violent conviction and three quarters physical hardihood.†   (source)
  • And if he did, could he avoid that which would preclude any claim in the future?†   (source)
  • the fact that one is mounted does not preclude a fall.†   (source)
  • There had been a germ of truth in his declaration to Gerty Farish that he had never wanted to marry a "nice" girl: the adjective connoting, in his cousin's vocabulary, certain utilitarian qualities which are apt to preclude the luxury of charm.†   (source)
  • The precautions were needless for the situation of the parties outside the door was so harassed as to preclude any but the most fleeting judgments on matters not pertinent to themselves.†   (source)
  • I hope your civilian principles do not preclude your knowing what it is you owe me, because otherwise I would be forced to find means to test those principles in a way that—" A sharp bow from Herr Settembrini induced him to continue, "Ah, I see that will not be necessary.†   (source)
  • This did not preclude the immediate discovery that she was some years younger than her visitor, and that under her showiness, her ease, the aggression of her dress and voice, there persisted that ineradicable innocence which, in ladies of her nationality, so curiously coexists with startling extremes of experience.†   (source)
  • Javert remained silent for an instant as though collecting his ideas, then raised his voice with a sort of sad solemnity, which did not, however, preclude simplicity.†   (source)
  • considered that the accused, not pleading guilty to the charges made against him, had brought forward nothing in his defense, while the witnesses, so-and-so, and so-and-so, and the circumstances such-and-such testify against him, acting in accordance with such-and-such articles of the Statute Book, and so on, has ruled, that, in order to preclude so-and-so (Mitya) from all means of evading pursuit and judgment he be detained in such-and-such a prison, which he hereby notifies to the accused and communicates a copy of this same "Committal" to the deputy prosecutor, and so on, and so on.†   (source)
  • Their homes were so distant, and the circles in which they moved so distinct, as almost to preclude the means of ever hearing of each other's existence during the eleven following years, or, at least, to make it very wonderful to Sir Thomas that Mrs. Norris should ever have it in her power to tell them, as she now and then did, in an angry voice, that Fanny had got another child.†   (source)
  • By going one step farther back in thought, discordant opinions are reconciled by being seen to be two extremes of one principle, and we can never go so far back as to preclude a still higher vision.†   (source)
  • I speak of this point chiefly for the sake of method; for the strength of Madame L'Espanaye would have been utterly unequal to the task of thrusting her daughter's corpse up the chimney as it was found; and the nature of the wounds upon her own person entirely preclude the idea of self-destruction.†   (source)
  • "This communication," continued the procureur, in that cold and decisive tone which seemed at once to preclude all discussion, "will, we are sure, meet with your approbation."†   (source)
  • The fire was issuing from a long straw-stack, which was so far gone as to preclude a possibility of saving it.†   (source)
  • "I rather hope to satisfy you both," said Emma, "for I shall do all in my power to make them happy, which will be enough for Isabella; and happiness must preclude false indulgence and physic."†   (source)
  • The rattling of the drum broke the silence of that tranquil water, and the echoes of the tattoo were heard among the mountains, so soon after the ceremony was over as to preclude the danger of interruption.†   (source)
  • With the precision and definiteness customary in addressing prisoners, and which is supposed to preclude human frailty, Pierre like the others was questioned as to who he was, where he had been, with what object, and so on.†   (source)
  • "That is just why I do not begin, sire," said Kutuzov in a resounding voice, apparently to preclude the possibility of not being heard, and again something in his face twitched—"That is just why I do not begin, sire, because we are not on parade and not on the Empress' Field," said clearly and distinctly.†   (source)
  • From a meteorological point of view, these cold winds possessed this peculiarity, that they did not preclude a strong electric tension.†   (source)
  • By what could such a situation be precluded?†   (source)
  • Why might these several provisional contingencies between a guest and a hostess not necessarily preclude or be precluded by a permanent eventuality of reconciliatory union between a schoolfellow and a jew's daughter?†   (source)
  • And in that case, the people ought not surely to be precluded from giving most of their confidence where they may discover it to be most due; but even in that case the State governments could have little to apprehend, because it is only within a certain sphere that the federal power can, in the nature of things, be advantageously administered.†   (source)
  • Why might these several provisional contingencies between a guest and a hostess not necessarily preclude or be precluded by a permanent eventuality of reconciliatory union between a schoolfellow and a jew's daughter?†   (source)
  • The design of the objection, which has been mentioned, is to preclude standing armies in time of peace, though we have never been informed how far it is designed the prohibition should extend; whether to raising armies as well as to KEEPING THEM UP in a season of tranquillity or not.†   (source)
  • And what should you be able to conclude From my fervent desire to preclude The marriage that has been announced just now?†   (source)
  • Their number, without an unwarrantable increase of expense, cannot be large enough to preclude a facility of combination.†   (source)
  • Some of these indeed have declared that PERMANENT1 salaries should be established for the judges; but the experiment has in some instances shown that such expressions are not sufficiently definite to preclude legislative evasions.†   (source)
  • A wise nation will combine all these considerations; and, whilst it does not rashly preclude itself from any resource which may become essential to its safety, will exert all its prudence in diminishing both the necessity and the danger of resorting to one which may be inauspicious to its liberties.†   (source)
  • It will not answer to make an express exception of cases which shall have been originally tried by a jury, because in the courts of some of the States ALL CAUSES are tried in this mode4; and such an exception would preclude the revision of matters of fact, as well where it might be proper, as where it might be improper.†   (source)
▲ show less (of above)