When we consider the active part Defoe himself took in public affairs, we shall not be surprised that offence was given by his Countenancing the civil disabilities of Dissenters, and that the Dissenting preachers declined to recognise him as properly belonging to their body.
"Daniel Defoe"
William Minto
He is right, for assuredly the poor intellectual abuses of the time want Countenancing now as much as ever, but so far as he countenances them, he should bear in mind that he is returning to the ground of common sense, and should not therefore hold himself too stiffly in the matter of logic.
"Luck or Cunning?"
Samuel Butler
Was it intimidated by a statement that trespassers would be prosecuted, nailed to an oak-tree, legible a hundred years ago, perhaps, when its nails were not rust, and really held it tight-instead of, as now, merely Countenancing its wish to remain from old habit?
"Somehow Good"
William de Morgan