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propitious
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show 135 more with this conextual meaning
  • Propitious, if you will.†   (source)
  • And do you Inow why the name is p-p-propitious for our endeavor?†   (source)
  • For this reason, and not out of neglect, as was later said, the hatbox was stowed away in the basement, where it awaited a more propitious moment to be given a Christian burial.†   (source)
  • Dr. Juvenal Urbino had often thought, with no premonitory intention, that this would not be a propitious place for dying in a state of grace.†   (source)
  • It was not a propitious start to the day.†   (source)
  • But this was entirely different from any of those and seemed, somehow, attractive, wholesome, propitious.†   (source)
  • Unanimity, however, might be an agreement to disagree, to wait for a more propitious time to propose a solution.†   (source)
  • Six of the Warrior's Sons escorted him across the city; together they were seven, a holy, and propitious number.†   (source)
  • Felicia will trap her into a confession: She waits until the moon is propitious, then calls Graciela on the telephone, inviting her to the beauty shop for a free permanent.†   (source)
  • They say fall is the most propitious time to start footbinding, but only because winter is coming and cold weather helps numb the feet.†   (source)
  • Though they joked about hiring a fengshui expert to determine a propitious day for the grand reopening, in the end Ralph and Helen — more practically — simply planned to resume business as soon as possible.†   (source)
  • Ira had been given in marriage in the month of June, which is the propitious season for weddings, and what with the preparing for it, and the listlessness that took hold of me in the first days after her departure, nothing was done to make our hut weatherproof or to secure the land from flooding.†   (source)
  • It was not a propitious sign to see Jim in the desk opposite us.†   (source)
  • Because the time is propitious to do so.†   (source)
  • It was always cold, this morning provender (as if to feed pets, the female cook left it in the pan each night by the kitchen door, from whence Bronek fetched it at daybreak), and usually consisted of a greasy potpourri of bones with bits of meat and gristle attached, crusts of bread (on propitious days smeared with a little margarine), vegetable remnants and sometimes a half-eaten apple or pear.†   (source)
  • And it never occurred to the bush boy to wait for a more propitious moment.†   (source)
  • I thought there might be a hope of defending myself and clearing my good name at some time in the future, in more propitious circumstances.†   (source)
  • The first few days of the voyage passed prosperously, amid favourable weather and propitious winds,   (source)
  • If he could have counted on Fermina Daza's consent, no occasion would have been more propitious.†   (source)
  • At a propitious moment he suggested that all of this was easier in the light.†   (source)
  • I vowed that from here on I would use diviners only to find propitious dates.†   (source)
  • "In fact," he added, winking at Nels, "the timing of this power outage is even more propitious than my colleague for the defense suspects.†   (source)
  • Fortunately, she managed to restrain herself within her mother for a few more hours and to enter the world in her grandparents' house, on the day, the hour, and in the place most propitious for her horoscope.†   (source)
  • The peaceful suburb with its beautiful tradition of love was, however, not the most propitious for unrequited love when it became a luxury neighborhood.†   (source)
  • And when the Thief was in the Moonmaid, that was a propitious time for a man to steal a woman, Ygritte insisted.†   (source)
  • The tenth day of the tenth month arrived—a good and propitious date for the neighbor girl to begin her wedding activities.†   (source)
  • Perhaps he would have used the diviner to find a propitious spot with the best feng shui elements for her burial or hired a palanquin to transport his daughter and niece, who still could not walk very far, to the grave site.†   (source)
  • I suggested when the moment seemed propitious.†   (source)
  • But what is the state of mind that is most propitious to the act of creation?†   (source)
  • Nor, when at last we met, were the circumstances propitious.†   (source)
  • Then, a year's study of the lean, clear precision of Caesar, the magnificent structure of the style—the concision, the skeleton certainty, deadened by the disjointed daily partition, the dull parsing, the lumbering cliché of pedantic translation: "Having done all things that were necessary, and the season now being propitious for carrying on war, Caesar began to arrange his legions in battle array.†   (source)
  • Yes, all is propitious.†   (source)
  • The meeting was not very propitious, for I was still unkempt and uncombed after my night out, and I had not shaved.†   (source)
  • Then before she finished the words Wang Lung struck his hands together in delight and he said, "Now then, that is where I sell my grain, and it is a propitious thing and surely it can be done," and for the first time his interest was awake, because it seemed to him a lucky thing to wed his son to the daughter of the man who bought his grain.†   (source)
  • And this susceptibility of theirs is doubly unfortunate, I thought, returning again to my original enquiry into what state of mind is most propitious for creative work, because the mind of an artist, in order to achieve the prodigious effort of freeing whole and entire the work that is in him, must be incandescent, like Shakespeare's mind, I conjectured, looking at the book which lay open at ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA.†   (source)
  • The surrounding atmosphere was propitious to this scheme of courtship.†   (source)
  • It had hardly been a propitious beginning, but he had chosen his course, and would show no swerving.†   (source)
  • The chemist began saying— "Indeed the weather is not propitious on account of the damp."†   (source)
  • Here Jondrette evidently judged the moment propitious for capturing the "philanthropist."†   (source)
  • Speak soft words to those who do not understand this that the return may be propitious.†   (source)
  • Providence is now opposed to them, when I most thought it would be propitious.†   (source)
  • At this propitious time of public distress did Tom Walker set up as usurer in Boston.†   (source)
  • And in this case the bearing appeared to be entirely propitious.†   (source)
  • He awaited the propitious moment with the crafty patience of the sick.†   (source)
  • greatest of the gods, be thou propitious to-night.†   (source)
  • The dew fell, but with propitious softness; no breeze whispered.†   (source)
  • The day was declining, there was not even a cat in the lane, the hour was propitious.†   (source)
  • The time is now propitious, as he guesses, The meal is ended, she is bored and tired, Endeavours to engage her in caresses Which are still unreproved, if undesired.†   (source)
  • How much we love him—as at that moment I loved Francoise—the good-natured intermediary who by a single word has made supportable, human, almost propitious the inconceivable, infernal scene of gaiety in the thick of which we had been imagining swarms of enemies, perverse and seductive, beguiling away from us, even making laugh at us, the woman whom we love.†   (source)
  • And after that, the general circumstances proving fairly propitious, there would be, of course, other week-end invitations to the Harriets', Phants' and some others who dwelt there, as well as to the Griffiths' at Greenwood, to which place, on account of Bella, he could easily come.†   (source)
  • Two warm sunny days in early May inclined Mr. Hutter to the opinion that pleasant spring weather was at hand and that it would be a propitious time to climb up on the desert to look after his sheep interests.†   (source)
  • The moment was propitious, for the rustlers were bustling around, cooking dinner, unrolling blankets, and moving to and fro from spring and corral.†   (source)
  • Swann, which—since it preserved me from the terrible risk of seeing her appear on one of the paths, and of being identified and scorned by this so privileged little girl who had Bergotte for a friend and used to go with him to visit cathedrals—made the exploration of Tansonville, now for the first time permitted me, a matter of indifference to myself, seemed however to invest the property, in my grandfather's and father's eyes, with a fresh and transient charm, and (like an entirely cloudless sky when one is going mountaineering) to make the day extraordinarily propitious for a walk in this direction; I should have liked to see their reckoning proved false, to see, by a miracle, Mlle.†   (source)
  • I found an additional merit in everything that was in my mind at the moment, in the pink reflection of the tiled roof, the wild grass in the wall, the village of Roussainville into which I had long desired to penetrate, the trees of its wood and the steeple of its church, created in them by this fresh emotion which made them appear more desirable only because I thought it was they that had provoked it, and which seemed only to wish to bear me more swiftly towards them when it filled my sails with a potent, unknown, and propitious breeze.†   (source)
  • Mrs. Bry, who had a tendency to grow red and stertorous after luncheon, had been judiciously prevailed upon by Carry Fisher to withdraw to her hotel for an hour's repose; and Selden and his companion were thus left to a stroll propitious to confidences.†   (source)
  • The terrace at Bellomont on a September afternoon was a spot propitious to sentimental musings, and as Miss Bart stood leaning against the balustrade above the sunken garden, at a little distance from the animated group about the tea-table, she might have been lost in the mazes of an inarticulate happiness.†   (source)
  • For some time, I am doubtful of Miss Shepherd's feelings, but, at length, Fate being propitious, we meet at the dancing-school.†   (source)
  • As he took the cup from my hand, Adele, thinking the moment propitious for making a request in my favour, cried out — "N'est-ce pas, monsieur, qu'il y a un cadeau pour Mademoiselle Eyre dans votre petit coffre?"†   (source)
  • "A puff o' wind 'ud make 'em blow about like feathers," Kezia the housemaid said, feeling proud to live under a mistress who could make such pastry; so that no season or circumstances could have been more propitious for a family party, even if it had not been advisable to consult sister Glegg and sister Pullet about Tom's going to school.†   (source)
  • The Roman made an expiatory offering, and prayed, Whatever god or goddess thou art to whom this grove is sacred, be propitious to me, my family, and children, etc. It is remarkable what a value is still put upon wood even in this age and in this new country, a value more permanent and universal than that of gold.†   (source)
  • I am sorry to say that only the third day after the propitious events at Houndsley Fred Vincy had fallen into worse spirits than he had known in his life before.†   (source)
  • There were points on which they did not quite agree; there were moments in which she did not seem propitious; and though trusting altogether to her affection, so far as to be resolved—almost resolved—on bringing it to a decision within a very short time, as soon as the variety of business before him were arranged, and he knew what he had to offer her, he had many anxious feelings, many doubting hours as to the result.†   (source)
  • Marmaduke had early forewarned his daughter of the season, and of its effect on the prospect; and after casting a cursory glance at its capabilities, the party returned homeward, perfectly satisfied that its beauties would repay them for the toil of a second ride at a more propitious season.†   (source)
  • It was a very long succession of uninteresting loamy and fertile flats, a very easy country for the construction of railways, and propitious for the laying-down of these direct level lines so dear to railway companies.†   (source)
  • The propitious influence which a democratic state of society may exercise upon orderly habits, is one of those tendencies which can only be discovered after a time.†   (source)
  • Her answer, therefore, was not propitious, at least not to Elizabeth's wishes, for she was impatient to get home.†   (source)
  • At such a happy time, so propitious to the interests of religion and morality, Mr Arthur Clennam, newly arrived from Marseilles by way of Dover, and by Dover coach the Blue-eyed Maid, sat in the window of a coffee-house on Ludgate Hill.†   (source)
  • Everything seemed propitious to the execution of this plan, and the course being a continued descent, the young man went over the ground at a rate that promised a speedy termination to his toil.†   (source)
  • But the broad circle of light was gradually increasing in extent and power, and the old man, whose eye and judgment so rarely failed him, patiently awaited a more propitious moment for his enterprise.†   (source)
  • A stealthy glance now and then refreshed her like sips of fresh water after a dusty walk, for the sidelong peeps showed her several propitious omens.†   (source)
  • Gringoire, a practical philosopher of the streets of Paris, had noticed that nothing is more propitious to revery than following a pretty woman without knowing whither she is going.†   (source)
  • "To-morrow—and the next day," he said, counting aloud, "then, to speak in the Roman style, if the sea-gods be propitious, the consul arrives.†   (source)
  • Master Olivier, perceiving the king to be in a liberal mood, and judging the moment to be propitious, approached in his turn.†   (source)
  • Propitious circumstances and good laws might succeed in drawing to the legislature of a democratic people men very superior to those who are returned by the Americans to Congress; but nothing will ever prevent the men of slender abilities who sit there from obtruding themselves with complacency, and in all ways, upon the public.†   (source)
  • Taking advantage of the propitious moment, Meg slipped away and ran down to greet her husband with a smiling face and the little blue bow in her hair which was his especial admiration.†   (source)
  • When the ferocious devotional exercises were engaged in, these speculations would distract Mistress Affery's eyes towards the door, as if she expected some dark form to appear at those propitious moments, and make the party one too many.†   (source)
  • Still, it was not absolutely love that Hetty felt for Hurry, nor do we wish so to portray it, but merely that awakening sensibility and admiration, which, under more propitious circumstances, and always supposing no untoward revelations of character on the part of the young man had supervened to prevent it, might soon have ripened into that engrossing feeling.†   (source)
  • That feature too is propitious.†   (source)
  • She walked up and down the long saloon while waiting for Laurie, and once arranged herself under the chandelier, which had a good effect upon her hair, then she thought better of it, and went away to the other end of the room, as if ashamed of the girlish desire to have the first view a propitious one.†   (source)
  • He was like one under the propitious influence of a charm, from the moment of his being usefully employed; and if there were a happy man in the world, that Saturday night, it was the grateful creature who thought my aunt the most wonderful woman in existence, and me the most wonderful young man.†   (source)
  • Leaning over the battlements and looking far down, I surveyed the grounds laid out like a map: the bright and velvet lawn closely girdling the grey base of the mansion; the field, wide as a park, dotted with its ancient timber; the wood, dun and sere, divided by a path visibly overgrown, greener with moss than the trees were with foliage; the church at the gates, the road, the tranquil hills, all reposing in the autumn day's sun; the horizon bounded by a propitious sky, azure, marbled with pearly white.†   (source)
  • Chapter IX — IN WHICH THE RED SEA AND THE INDIAN OCEAN PROVE PROPITIOUS TO THE DESIGNS OF PHILEAS FOGG†   (source)
  • On the right, down stream, the bridge of Jena was discernible, on the left, upstream, the bridge of the Invalides; the place would have been a propitious one in which to await the night and to escape.†   (source)
  • After going about two hundred miles, the travellers at last found themselves on one of those vast plains which extend to the Atlantic, and which nature has made so propitious for laying the iron road.†   (source)
  • If I am not deseaved in my opinion, I think I may hope that your generous heart will melt at this statement and the desire will subjugate you to be propitious to me by daigning to lavish on me a slight favor.†   (source)
  • And smile propitious on thy solemn day!   (source)
    propitious = favorably
  • Those answers had been thrust upon him from such an unexpected source, and in such an unpropitious setting, it was more than he could make sense of at the moment.†   (source)
    standard prefix: The prefix "un-" in unpropitious means not and reverses the meaning of propitious. This is the same pattern you see in words like unhappy, unknown, and unlucky.
  • Nothing would be moving, for the day was unpropitious and instincts were blurred and not to be trusted.†   (source)
  • But, when all is said, it remained an unpropitious meeting.†   (source)
  • The revolution was left inside society, a part of that welter of ideological struggle which art and poetry find so unpropitious as soon as it begins to involve those "precious" axiomatic beliefs upon which culture thus far has had to rest.†   (source)
  • At this unpropitious moment her name was called.†   (source)
  • The way to his house was crooked and miry—even difficult in the present unpropitious season.†   (source)
  • It was some time before he obtained any answer, and the reply, when made, was unpropitious.†   (source)
  • Passepartout was enraged beyond expression by the unpropitious weather.†   (source)
  • He had been frank with himself—let alone with me—in the wild hope of arriving in that way at some effective refutation, and the stars had been ironically unpropitious.†   (source)
  • He glanced at the dirty and unpropitious corner on which they stood, with the shriek of the "elevated" and the tumult of trams and waggons contending hideously in their ears.†   (source)
  • And poor Silas was vaguely conscious of something not unlike the feeling of primitive men, when they fled thus, in fear or in sullenness, from the face of an unpropitious deity.†   (source)
  • It seemed that the omen was an unpropitious one, for, as the rather untoward commencement of Oak's overtures, just as he arrived by the garden gate, he saw a cat inside, going into various arched shapes and fiendish convulsions at the sight of his dog George.†   (source)
  • CHAPTER XVII: OLIVER'S DESTINY CONTINUING UNPROPITIOUS, BRINGS A GREAT MAN TO LONDON TO INJURE HIS REPUTATION†   (source)
  • 'It is not for one, situated, through his original errors and a fortuitous combination of unpropitious events, as is the foundered Bark (if he may be allowed to assume so maritime a denomination), who now takes up the pen to address you — it is not, I repeat, for one so circumstanced, to adopt the language of compliment, or of congratulation.†   (source)
  • That was an unpropitious hour for coming home: it was too early to gain the moral support under ennui of dressing his person for dinner, and too late to undress his mind of the day's frivolous ceremony and affairs, so as to be prepared for a good plunge into the serious business of study.†   (source)
  • Mr. and Mrs. Sowerberry—the shop being shut up—were taking their supper in the little back-parlour, when Mr. Sowerberry, after several deferential glances at his wife, said, 'My dear—' He was going to say more; but, Mrs. Sowerberry looking up, with a peculiarly unpropitious aspect, he stopped short.†   (source)
  • The place where the traveller found himself seemed unpropitious for obtaining either shelter or refreshment, and he was likely to be reduced to the usual expedient of knights-errant, who, on such occasions, turned their horses to graze, and laid themselves down to meditate on their lady-mistress, with an oak-tree for a canopy.†   (source)
  • II He Is Set Upon by Adversities; but He Sings a Song The result of that unpropitious interview was that Eustacia, instead of passing the afternoon with her grandfather, hastily returned home to Clym, where she arrived three hours earlier than she had been expected.†   (source)
  • Stimulated no less by the unpropitious aspect of the skies, than by his secret uneasiness, he quickened his pace, making long and rapid strides in the direction of the cottage of Inesella.†   (source)
  • The sea was not very unpropitious, the wind seemed stationary in the north-east, the sails were hoisted, and the Henrietta ploughed across the waves like a real trans-Atlantic steamer.†   (source)
  • She had a thin awkward figure, a sallow skin without colour, dark lank hair, and strong features—so much for her person; and not less unpropitious for heroism seemed her mind.†   (source)
  • In a review of these transactions we may trace some of the causes which would be likely to embroil the States with each other, if it should be their unpropitious destiny to become disunited.†   (source)
  • Not the rich, more than the poor; not the learned, more than the ignorant; not the haughty heirs of distinguished names, more than the humble sons of obscurity and unpropitious fortune.†   (source)
  • The propitious moment.†   (source)
  • The moment was too propitious for the display of that discursiveness which seemed the only bond of union among tempers so divergent.†   (source)
  • And later on at a propitious opportunity he purposed (Bloom did), without anyway prying into his private affairs on the fools step in where angels principle, advising him to sever his connection with a certain budding practitioner who, he noticed, was prone to disparage and even to a slight extent with some hilarious pretext when not present, deprecate him, or whatever you like to call it which in Bloom's humble opinion threw a nasty sidelight on that side of a person's character, no pun intended.†   (source)
  • Let not my words offend thee, Heavenly Power;
    My Maker, be propitious while I speak.†   (source)
  • If Jove assists the passage of our fleet, The third propitious dawn discovers Crete.'†   (source)
  • what use of valor can be made, When heav'n's propitious pow'rs refuse their aid!†   (source)
  • "Thinkest thou, Malacoda, to see me come here," said my Master, "safe hitherto from all your hindrances, except by Will Divine and fate propitious?†   (source)
  • The first that ever was canonized at Rome, was Romulus, and that upon the narration of Julius Proculus, that swore before the Senate, he spake with him after his death, and was assured by him, he dwelt in Heaven, and was there called Quirinius, and would be propitious to the State of their new City: And thereupon the Senate gave Publique Testimony of his Sanctity.†   (source)
  • Let us pause, my fellow-citizens, for one moment, over this melancholy and monitory lesson of history; and with the tear that drops for the calamities brought on mankind by their adverse opinions and selfish passions, let our gratitude mingle an ejaculation to Heaven, for the propitious concord which has distinguished the consultations for our political happiness.†   (source)
  • O favourable Spirit, propitious guest,
    Well hast thou taught the way that might direct
    Our knowledge, and the scale of nature set
    From center to circumference; whereon,
    In contemplation of created things,
    By steps we may ascend to God.†   (source)
  • Whence thou returnest, and whither wentest, I know;
    For God is also in sleep; and dreams advise,
    Which he hath sent propitious, some great good
    Presaging, since with sorrow and heart's distress
    Wearied I fell asleep: But now lead on;
    In me is no delay; with thee to go,
    Is to stay here; without thee here to stay,
    Is to go hence unwilling; thou to me
    Art all things under Heaven, all places thou,
    Who for my wilful crime art banished hence.†   (source)
  • The gods," said he, "To him propitious, and averse to thee, Have giv'n his arm superior force to thine.†   (source)
  • his tillage brought
    First fruits, the green ear, and the yellow sheaf,
    Unculled, as came to hand; a shepherd next,
    More meek, came with the firstlings of his flock,
    Choicest and best; then, sacrificing, laid
    The inwards and their fat, with incense strowed,
    On the cleft wood, and all due rights performed:
    His offering soon propitious fire from Heaven
    Consumed with nimble glance, and grateful steam;
    The other's not, for his was not sincere;
    Whereat he inly raged, and, as they talked,
    Smote him into the midriff with a stone
    That beat out life; he fell; and, deadly pale,
    Groaned out his soul with gushing blood effused.†   (source)
  • If my religious hand Your plant has honor'd, which your foes profan'd, Propitious hear my pious pray'r!†   (source)
  • But now, by Jove's command, and fate's decree, His race is doom'd to reign in Italy: With humble suit I beg thy needful art, O still propitious pow'r, that rules my heart!†   (source)
  • At length he rais'd his cheerful head, and spoke: "The pow'rs," said he, "the pow'rs we both invoke, To you, and yours, and mine, propitious be, And firm our purpose with their augury!†   (source)
  • Which monsters lest the Trojans' pious host Should bear, or touch upon th' inchanted coast, Propitious Neptune steer'd their course by night With rising gales that sped their happy flight.†   (source)
  • Agrippa seconds him, with prosp'rous gales, And, with propitious gods, his foes assails: A naval crown, that binds his manly brows, The happy fortune of the fight foreshows.†   (source)
  • propitious to the Moorish race, Who feast on painted beds, with off'rings grace Thy temples, and adore thy pow'r divine With blood of victims, and with sparkling wine, Seest thou not this?†   (source)
  • The foll'wing night, and the succeeding day, Propitious Tiber smooth'd his wat'ry way: He roll'd his river back, and pois'd he stood, A gentle swelling, and a peaceful flood.†   (source)
  • Propitious Heav'n, and gracious Juno, lead This wand'ring navy to your needful aid: How will your empire spread, your city rise, From such a union, and with such allies?†   (source)
  • They mount the cliff, where Pallas' temple stands; Pray'rs in their mouths, and presents in their hands, With censers first they fume the sacred shrine, Then in this common supplication join: "O patroness of arms, unspotted maid, Propitious hear, and lend thy Latins aid!†   (source)
  • Aeneas then unsheath'd his shining sword, And thus with pious pray'rs the gods ador'd: "All-seeing sun, and thou, Ausonian soil, For which I have sustain'd so long a toil, Thou, King of Heav'n, and thou, the Queen of Air, Propitious now, and reconcil'd by pray'r; Thou, God of War, whose unresisted sway The labors and events of arms obey; Ye living fountains, and ye running floods, All pow'rs of ocean, all ethereal gods, Hear, and bear record: if I fall in field, Or, recreant in the fight, to Turnus yield, My Trojans shall encrease Evander's town; Ascanius shall renounce th' Ausonian crown: All claims, all questions of debate, shall cease; Nor he, nor they, with force infringe the peace.†   (source)
  • Thus while he wrought, revolving in his mind The ways to compass what his wish design'd, He cast his eyes upon the gloomy grove, And then with vows implor'd the Queen of Love: "O may thy pow'r, propitious still to me, Conduct my steps to find the fatal tree, In this deep forest; since the Sibyl's breath Foretold, alas!†   (source)
  • The prince himself, with awful dread possess'd, His vows to great Apollo thus address'd: "Indulgent god, propitious pow'r to Troy, Swift to relieve, unwilling to destroy, Directed by whose hand the Dardan dart Pierc'd the proud Grecian's only mortal part: Thus far, by fate's decrees and thy commands, Thro' ambient seas and thro' devouring sands, Our exil'd crew has sought th' Ausonian ground; And now, at length, the flying coast is found.†   (source)
  • This lucky moment the sly traitor chose: Then, starting from his ambush, up he rose, And threw, but first to Heav'n address'd his vows: "O patron of Socrates' high abodes, Phoebus, the ruling pow'r among the gods, Whom first we serve, whole woods of unctuous pine Are fell'd for thee, and to thy glory shine; By thee protected with our naked soles, Thro' flames unsing'd we march, and tread the kindled coals Give me, propitious pow'r, to wash away The stains of this dishonorable day: Nor spoils, nor triumph, from the fact I claim, But with my future actions trust my fame.†   (source)
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