"Are all these breeds of dogs you have made useful?" they asked. "Oh--useful! Why, the hunting dogs and watchdogs and sheepdogs are useful--and sleddogs of course!--and ratters, I suppose, but we don't keep dogs for their USEFULNESS. The dog is `the friend of man,' we say--we love them."
That they understood. "We love our cats that way. They surely are our friends, and helpers, too. You can see how intelligent and affectionate they are."
It was a fact. I'd never seen such cats, except in a few rare instances.英文原著 · 《Herland》
The Menace of the Press-Notice
Now testimonials and press-notices very often serve useful ends. In lyceum work, in teaching, in very many lines, they are often useful to introduce a stranger. A letter of introduction is useful. A diploma, a degree, a certificate, a license, are but different kinds of testimonials. The danger is that the hero of them may get to leaning upon them. Then they become a mirror for his vanity instead of a monitor for his vitality. Most testimonials and press-notices are frank flatteries. They magnify the good points and say little as possible about the bad ones.英文原著 · 《The University of Hard Knocks》
"I managed it so that she should be seen, and should not see. Our former experience of Danville suggested to me the propriety of making the experiment, and my old police-office practice came in useful in carrying it out. I saw the carriage standing at the door, and waited till the old lady came down. I walked your sister away as she got in, and walked her back again past the window as the carriage drove off. A moment did it, and it turned out as useful as I thought it would. Enough of that! Go back now to your sister. Keep indoors till the night mail starts for Rouen.英文原著 · 《AFTER DARK》
The habits of industry and of order which the soldier acquired when in garrison, rendered him so much the more useful as a labourer when on furlough; but not contented with merely furnishing labours for the assistance of the husbandman, I was desirous of making use of the army, as a means of introducing useful improvements into the country.英文原著 · 《ESSAYS-1》
Though agriculture is carried to the highest perfection in some parts of the Elector's dominions, yet in others, and particularly in Bavaria, it is still much behind-hand. Very few of the new improvements in that art, such as the introduction of new and useful plants--the cultivation of clover and of turnips--the regular succession of crops, etc. have yet found their way into general practice in that country; and even the potatoe, that most useful of all the products of the ground, is scarcely known there.英文原著 · 《ESSAYS-1》
"I haven't any talent, or any especial taste that I can see, and that is why I can't decide, uncle. So, I think it would be a good plan to pick out some very useful business and learn it, because I don't do it for pleasure, you see, but as a part of my education, and to be ready in case I'm ever poor," answered Rose, looking as if she rather longed for a little poverty so that her useful gift might be exercised.英文原著 · 《Eight Cousins》
This can be useful, remind us why we love what we do.美剧 · 《Billions》
It's supposed to give you useful information to make this session more productive, to save you from using techniques that I might have already parried.美剧 · 《Billions》
Realize that limits, constraints, they can be useful.美剧 · 《Billions》
The ideas they're bringing... Some deployable, some useful as a benchmark of what other firms will be thinking and how we need to do better, but none platonically good.美剧 · 《Billions》