They rolled through a gradual effacement of things, seeing the lights of the farmhouses in the long plain start into existence, and then remain fixed, like gold beetles pinned on a blue curtain.

Of course he tried to explain to Margery that it was an absolute accident and he only wanted to get a sighting post; but that was mere self-effacement, and I said so.

But everyone applauds the patriotic self-effacement of Sir William Robertson in silently accepting the Eastern Command at home.

It is impossible to arrest this tendency: all we can do is to moderate its course so as to hinder it from degrading the moral status of societies by a too rapid effacement of those national traditions and customs which are the language of the national geniusthe deep suckers of healthy sentiment.

He had resolved to pass out of her life in order to save her from his old age and his poverty; he wished her to be rich and free, to enjoy her youth, far away from him; this indeed was utter self-effacement, complete absorption in the love of another.