No tyranny is so irksome as petty tyranny: the officious demands of policemen, government clerks, and electromechanical gadgets. From LearnThat.org. [Edward Abbey (1927-1989), American writer and radical environmentalist.]
There is a kind of officious attentiveness which is really the expression of a species of vanity. From Wordnik.com. [Letters to a Daughter and A Little Sermon to School Girls] Reference
A simplistic way of looking at this would be to adopt a kind of officious bystander test who is stood alongside the states making the treaties. From Wordnik.com. [German Constitutional Court approves Lisbon - with provisos] Reference
Incomparably clever is the satire on the benevolent societies which exist to furnish a kind of officious sense of virtue to their aristocratic members. From Wordnik.com. [Essays on Scandinavian Literature] Reference
"officious" lie for some useful purpose, and a "mischievous" lie in order to injure someone. From Wordnik.com. [Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) Translated by Fathers of the English Dominican Province] Reference
"officious" action, and how subtle are the changes which can be rung upon the two, but there was nothing of that description here. From Wordnik.com. [Life in Morocco and Glimpses Beyond] Reference
That shine, yet bear their bright officious lamps. From Wordnik.com. [The Astronomy of Milton's 'Paradise Lost'] Reference
He said; and straight th 'officious courser kneels. From Wordnik.com. [The Aeneid English] Reference
"I wish he would, and rid the world of an officious old maid.". From Wordnik.com. [Flint His Faults, His Friendships and His Fortunes] Reference
Not content with these official, or officious, manoeuvres, the German. From Wordnik.com. [The New York Times Current History, A Monthly Magazine The European War, March 1915] Reference
Some officious person immediately brought the story to Mrs. Caldwell. From Wordnik.com. [The Beth Book Being a Study of the Life of Elizabeth Caldwell Maclure, a Woman of Genius] Reference
J. Elfreda Briggs, a somewhat officious freshman, to the trio, and from. From Wordnik.com. [Grace Harlowe's Problem] Reference
Therefore there was no officious confirmation to settle any factual errors. From Wordnik.com. [Preacher Jefferson] Reference
"I suppose if I did, I shouldn't have any officious policeman to reckon with.". From Wordnik.com. [The Slave of Silence] Reference
He resented his dashing back post-haste for the funeral, it was too officious. From Wordnik.com. [Juggernaut] Reference
A score of officious hands held her cloak, a dozen officious voices called her chair. From Wordnik.com. [Ainslee's, Vol. 15, No. 6, July 1905] Reference
Auntie stopped him when, in his officious zeal, he was about to lock the carriage door. From Wordnik.com. [A Sheaf of Corn] Reference
Especially did she complain that Mr. Hounsditch had been officious since I was heard from. From Wordnik.com. [Swept Out to Sea Clint Webb Among the Whalers] Reference
But by the end of the week, Genoways had sent officious e-mails to at least two Review employees. From Wordnik.com. [Virginia Quarterly Review staffer died by his own hand, but he reached out first] Reference
She resented her sister's superior attitude, her officious poise, her college-education authority. From Wordnik.com. [Our Nervous Friends — Illustrating the Mastery of Nervousness] Reference
I like mystery, and I went about in daily dread of having it all made plain to me by some officious person. From Wordnik.com. [Ideala] Reference
"You are making yourself rather officious in this crowd," said a burly policeman to a notorious pickpocket. From Wordnik.com. [The New Pun Book] Reference
She had not emerged from her cloud of resentment against the officious Miss Walbert, nor was she likely to. From Wordnik.com. [Marjorie Dean, College Sophomore] Reference
“Thou hast need of Moonspirit?” demanded Mungongo, some of his officious confidence in Birnier returning. From Wordnik.com. [Witch-Doctors] Reference
When the fagots were piled up to his very neck, the duke of Bavaria was so officious as to desire him to abjure. From Wordnik.com. [Fox's Book of Martyrs Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs] Reference
It took great persuasive force, bordering close unto mob rule, before the officious officer in charge of the Y. M. From Wordnik.com. [The Delta of the Triple Elevens The History of Battery D, 311th Field Artillery US Army, American Expeditionary Forces] Reference
Sometimes this officer, if he manifested a disposition to be officious in the discharge of his duties, came to grief. From Wordnik.com. [History of Company F, 1st Regiment, R.I. Volunteers, during the Spring and Summer of 1861] Reference
The greatest degree of civil liberty is enjoyed where men are successfully restrained from such officious interposition. From Wordnik.com. [The Christian Foundation, Or, Scientific and Religious Journal, February, 1880] Reference
If some considered him officious, they could not have known his humility, much less his consuming passion for human beings. From Wordnik.com. [Frank H. Nelson of Cincinnati] Reference
The members of Irving's ring were to keep watch to prevent any officious interference from passers-by or from ward policemen. From Wordnik.com. [Bidwell's Travels, from Wall Street to London Prison Fifteen Years in Solitude] Reference
I wish you would not be so officious with your advice and your cautions, just as if I didn't know how to act as well as you do. '. From Wordnik.com. [Aunt Mary] Reference
Jacobite party, and believing that her sister was "drawn in by the persuasion of an officious female friend," Lord Mar's relation. From Wordnik.com. [Memoirs of the Jacobites of 1715 and 1745. Volume I.] Reference
Movies and television present great crises as times of frenetic activity, with officious aides ripping telephones off the hook and shouting instructions to scurrying subordinates. From Wordnik.com. [The Long Shadow Of Vietnam] Reference
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