Example sentences of "were [adv] a [adj] " in BNC.
Next page| No | Sentence |
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| 1 | The shoes , though , were altogether a different matter . |
| 2 | The first row of the audience were literally a few feet from my feet . |
| 3 | Even at their best in the early '80s , with the great Alison Phillips on drums , they were merely a poor man 's Fall/Three Johns/Creepers , although always reliable for a good live set . |
| 4 | Even at their best in the early '80s , with the great Alison Phillips on drums , they were merely a poor man 's Fall/Three Johns/Creepers , although always reliable for a good live set . |
| 5 | Their crimes were merely a low-grade reflection of the competitive and individualistic element in capitalism ; they indulged in an activity which , even in the form of mob violence , could never be effective in the revolutionary movement and , if not crushed , they were more likely to serve as ‘ part of a bribed tool of reactionary intrigue . ’ |
| 6 | However if evil were merely a hateful and external power without echo in the hearts of the good , then someone might have to take the Ring to the Cracks of Doom , but it need not be Frodo : Gandalf could be trusted with it , while whoever went would have only to distrust his enemies , not his friends and not himself . |
| 7 | He resisted , however , the notion that the polytechnics were merely a new breed of university . |
| 8 | In these , according to Engels , ideas and institutions were merely a direct reflection of economy and technology . |
| 9 | Lévi-Strauss ' famous objections to Sartre , which appeared in the last chapter of The Savage Mind ( 1962 ) , are sometimes represented as if they were merely a structuralist attack on Marxism . |
| 10 | They were only a hundred yards away now , still as a cobra before it strikes . |
| 11 | ONCE upon a time , whether you produced pots that were thrown on a wheel or hand-made and slab-sided , there were only a limited number of variables . |
| 12 | Many English Catholics remained deeply committed to the Stuart dynasty , for obvious reasons , although they were only a tiny minority of the population . |
| 13 | Fortunately , Gerald found an office job , with a national charity , and his symptoms were only a slight inconvenience . |
| 14 | I know you were only a junior minister , but one hears about things when one 's down the line , that he was very presidential , that he would n't let them talk much and was very stiff and frozen . |
| 15 | By 1840 Poles were almost entirely absent from the lists of Danzig merchants , were only a small minority on the list of Danzig house-owners , and were thus almost totally excluded from public life and government of the city . |
| 16 | Guns were only a small part of the Sussex output , and much better known were the ornamental cast-iron firebacks much in demand for the more sophisticated housing of the middling and upper ranks . |
| 17 | He thought that the latter were only a small minority . |
| 18 | He seems to have had no interest in the larger plans for the liberty of the Church from lay influence , of which these two matters were only a small instalment . |
| 19 | The formalities , as it turned out , were only a small part of what they had to face . |
| 20 | Mr Douglas Hurd , Foreign Secretary , made clear that the sanctions were only a first step , to be followed if necessary by a ban on oil exports , source of 95 per cent of Col Gaddafi 's revenue . |
| 21 | And er the chap that tended her was er a locum , he were only a young chap , and er he says , Oh oh I 'm sorry , he says , I 'd better get me old man to come , he said I do n't suppose I 'll ever see another of these in my career . |
| 22 | Because you were only a young lad were n't you . |
| 23 | He were only a young boy , seventeen year old . |
| 24 | And that were only a one tier . |
| 25 | The comments I made about the narrowness of Nicolson Street at the Community Centre was based on observations from Highways to the effect that it would not be possible to fit in a northbound bus lane unless there were only a single southbound lane and no bus stop . |
| 26 | Rochers town , we were only a short way and we went to this house , we were only young coppers , and we had this friend call on us and we looked out , he was going back into the car and he looked down the street and he said , my God there 's an awful lot of children around here , they must do nothing but screw all the time |
| 27 | and er I said to her do you miss London ? , and she said well she does for the theatre and that because they were only a short tube ride away from the West from the West End theatre 's and she said there 's more on in Poole here than there is in Bournemouth in terms of plays and |
| 28 | Even if it were only a dozen , they could with megaton bombs inflict widespread devastation . |
| 29 | Here the expression may , as so often , be read to blur the fact of a change of substance , to present a difference of kind as though it were only a modest difference of degree . |
| 30 | Such were only a few of the multitude of his accomplishments . |