heaven-defying

The imperial width of the thing,—the heaven-defying audacity—makes its modern newness.

DARKWATER W.E.B. DU BOIS 2004

Just to give you a sampling from his heaven-defying list – he once ate a Bible.

Conan O’Brien’s Stalky Clergyman Dodges Jail 2007

This feeble and most sensitive of spirits could do neither, yet continually did one thing or another, which intertwined, in the same inextricable knot, the agony of heaven-defying guilt and vain repentance.

The Scarlet Letter 2002

And here, since he had so valiantly forborne all other wickedness, poor Mr. Dimmesdale longed at least to shake hands with the tarry black-guard, and recreate himself with a few improper jests, such as dissolute sailors so abound with, and a volley of good, round, solid, satisfactory, and heaven-defying oaths!

The Scarlet Letter 2002

But the vulture and the jackal had been before him: naught remained of that haughty, revengeful, and heaven-defying woman, save the skull, the feet, and the palms of her hands.

Holidays at the Grange or A Week's Delight Games and Stories for Parlor and Fireside Emily Mayer Higgins

Then the blows came fast and furious, and the whole edifice, reared on that crumbling corner-stone of Slavery, reeled through all its heaven-defying heights.

The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 15, No. 87, January, 1865 Various

The great difficulty under which Mr. Sumner labors, and which all the energy of his soul struggles to surmount, is to find language violent enough in which to denounce this "foul enactment," this "detestable and heaven-defying bill," this "monster act," which "sets at naught the best principles of the Constitution and the very laws of God!"

Cotton is King, and Pro-Slavery Arguments Comprising the Writings of Hammond, Harper, Christy, Stringfellow, Hodge, Bledsoe, and Cartrwright on This Important Subject E. N. [Editor] Elliott

What is the cause of this wicked, heaven-defying, insane movement on the part of the South?

The Continental Monthly, Vol III, Issue VI, June, 1863 Devoted to Literature and National Policy Various

The very commencement of his reign, the occasion of so much joyful festivity to the court, was thus marked by crimes which brought utter desolation to the families and terror to the hearts of the people of his kingdom; and we may well presume that the woman who afterwards proved herself so reckless and heaven-defying, prompted to this first crime.

Notable Women of Olden Time Anonymous

"Our cities, towns and counties indicate that they have been cursed by the presence of a heaven-defying and hell-deserving rabble." —

History of Virginia 1924