Example sentences of "be merely " in BNC.
Next page| No | Sentence |
|---|---|
| 1 | Today , the image of the angel is still alive , and still in contention ; it has by no means been merely consigned to the museum . |
| 2 | First of all it had been merely a sense of unease , an occasional visitor . |
| 3 | The pretence that his , Surkov 's , opening had been merely a dream was a pathetic cliché . |
| 4 | However , all serious historians have noted that the 1925 decisions had been merely a formality , more honoured in the breach than in their application . |
| 5 | At first the sounds coming from Kensington had been merely confusing ; they heard the phone go down , heard Quinn shout ‘ Stay there ’ at someone , then a series of bangs , confused shouts and cries from McCrea and Somerville , then a series of regular bangs , as if someone was kicking a door . |
| 6 | He was a North-countryman , and the bluntness of his approach to many issues should be considered , I think , as a traditional North-country attitude , exaggerated at times to the point of obtuseness ; it may have been merely a defence mechanism . |
| 7 | Ellen and I both assumed that Sweetman 's interest in Wavebreaker had been merely that of a prospective charterer who wanted to reconnoitre the boat 's amenities . |
| 8 | At first it had been merely a matter of borrowing her mother 's scarves and veils , draping these around herself or twisting them into turbans and sashes . |
| 9 | He had been merely stating ‘ a professional opinion ’ . |
| 10 | This motivated dealers more than a previously introduced incentive to sell PEPS which had been merely an increase in dealers ' OTC takeback allowance . |
| 11 | Although Dotty had all the words , Dawn Allenby 's face spoke volumes ; until love had struck she had been merely adequate in the role of Olwyn . |
| 12 | The disruptions caused by newcomers have been merely a tangible symptom of this change . |
| 13 | Until this point , the structure of government outside Whitehall had been merely a matter which worried civil servants who wished to see their departmental policies executed more rapidly and efficiently , though some Liberals , some academics and sections of the ‘ quality press ’ had shown a passing interest in the subject . |
| 14 | Slowing him down had been merely the preparation for the real poisoned phial . |
| 15 | In this " process of corporate bias " , what had once been merely interest groups crossed the political threshold and became part of the extended state . |
| 16 | Cetera was subsequently cleared ( only to die later in mysterious circumstances ) but the real worry , for the DIA , was that the Italian court also found that the drug trafficking had been merely a cover , to justify payments to the Kabbaras as DEA informants . |
| 17 | But hitherto that interest had been merely one among many ; his temperament had precluded any drastic specialization , and he worked on an almost random variety of Greek topics , with a discernible bias only towards philosophy . |
| 18 | Any tenderness between the two of them would be a sham as far as he was concerned , merely serving to emphasise the absence of love , and perhaps like her he felt that a relationship characterised by so much other feeling ought to be loving as well , that the depth of desire he felt for her should have been merely a facet of love instead of the whole . |
| 19 | And even those captives who 'd got back to Danu , the town I mean , had been merely mice — helpless and squeaking — rolled this way and that as the cat pleased . |
| 20 | There was no sign of a studio and for a minute she expected to find that Alain had been merely frightening her — some hidden cruelty to make her feel uncomfortable , another chance to embarrass her . |
| 21 | Honesty made her admit she had hoped , but it had been merely dreaming , nothing like this harsh reality . |
| 22 | Nothing could shake the steadiness of such men as Hugh Waterton or John Norbury , who had been in his service from the time when he had been merely Henry of Bolingbroke , earl of Derby , and even that title borrowed by courtesy from his father . |
| 23 | Or had her initial fears been merely a result of the disorder of mind induced by her very apparent hunger ? |
| 24 | He 'd been merely indulging in an amusing diversion to pass the time . |
| 25 | Secondly , the goods had been merely set aside and not unconditionally appropriated . |
| 26 | On Dec. 4 , 1991 , Valverde had given to the parliamentary commission on industry a detailed exposition of Renfe 's role in the affair , which he claimed had been merely to execute plans made by the Transport Ministry and the Autonomous Community ( local council ) of Madrid . |
| 27 | From the beginning heads of missions had had secretaries who often played an important role ; but these had been recruited and paid by the diplomats themselves and had been merely their personal servants . |
| 28 | ‘ The conduct of the workers is deplorable , ’ wrote a French mining manager in 1869 , in the process of ferociously repressing the sort of strike of which Zola 's Germinal has given us a vivid picture , ‘ but one must recognise that they have been merely the savage instruments of agitators ’ . |
| 29 | It is submitted that in the former case the approach would probably be modified by the basic duty of fidelity to the extent that confidentiality would be lost only if the employer could be said to have shown wilful disregard to the quality of the confidence , rather than having been merely negligent . |
| 30 | I am merely a dyke-hag . |