It is quite clear that what hinders a true understanding of anything is vagueness; and it is by this process of asking questions that vagueness is to be dispelled: for, in the first place, it removes one great vagueness, or indistinctness, which is very apt to beset the minds of many; namely, the not clearly seeing whether they understand a thing or no; and much more, the not seeing what it is that they do understand, and what it is which they do not. ❋ Thomas Arnold (1818)
But I don't see how at the same time we are grappling with the "indistinctness" of literature we can also comfortably accede to its "reasoning" -- after all, "the imagination has to keep fitting things together that rational thought would keep apart" -- or its "moralizing." ❋ Unknown (2008)
I tell myself now, as a profane fact, that I did stand by that river (Methley gathered some seeds from the bushes that grew there), but since that I am away from his banks, “divine Scamander” has recovered the proper mystery belonging to him as an unseen deity; a kind of indistinctness, like that which belongs to far antiquity, has spread itself over my memory, of the winding stream that I saw with these very eyes. ❋ Alexander William Kinglake (1850)
Scamander” has recovered the proper mystery belonging to him as an unseen deity; a kind of indistinctness, like that which belongs to far antiquity, has spread itself over my memory, of the winding stream that I saw with these very eyes. ❋ Unknown (2003)
Her head was raised, and in the indistinctness I caught that sweet look of hers which besought me, and which I answered without knowing to what question. ❋ Unknown (2010)
The final chapter of What Good Are the Arts? tries to make a case for literature based on the its characteristic "indistinctness." ❋ Unknown (2008)
It has, that is, to keep ingeniously fabricating distinctness -- or whatever approximation to distinctness it decides to settle for -- out of indistinctness .... ❋ Unknown (2008)
What they were conjuring up he didn't know, but so far it was enormously impressive even in its indistinctness. ❋ Sugu Althomsons (2010)
Yet the murkiness of public discourse often results not from willful indistinctness but simply from a blithe, untutored lack of rhetorical know-how. ❋ Henry Hitchings (2010)
Literature can't both produce an indistinctness that every reader makes distinct in his/her own way (or leaves it indistinct) and make moral and rational claims that are presumably universal in their appeal. ❋ Unknown (2008)
The two halted, the nearer to us standing and facing Sunbury, the remoter being a grey indistinctness towards the evening star, away towards Staines. ❋ H. G. Wells (2009)
The distance of time makes some indistinctness of recollection, but it is believed the real name was MacEwen or MacMillan. ❋ Unknown (2008)
The critics throughout his career complained of “indistinctness,” “negligence,” and “coarseness.” ❋ James Gurney (2008)
With apologies for my remissness or indistinctness, I assured my lady that I accepted it most readily and gratefully. ❋ Unknown (2007)
It was interesting when I dressed before daylight to peep out of window, where my candles were reflected in the black panes like two beacons, and finding all beyond still enshrouded in the indistinctness of last night, to watch how it turned out when the day came on. ❋ Unknown (2007)
Sir Leicester, lying in his bed, can speak a little, though with difficulty and indistinctness. ❋ Unknown (2007)
They blushed, too, now and then, upon an indistinctness in her speech which she turned off with a girlish giggle, and on an occasional failing In her memory, that had no rule in it, but came and went fantastically, as if in mockery of her fantastic self. ❋ Unknown (2007)
Yet greater is the indistinctness when they are all jolted together in a little soul, which is narrow and has no room. ❋ Unknown (2007)
Yet greater is the indistinctness when they are all jostled together in a little soul, which has no room. ❋ Unknown (2007)
