Sentence:  As a boy young Arabin took up the cudgels on the side of the Tractarians, and at Oxford he sat for a while at the feet of the great [John Henry] Newman. To this cause he lent all his faculties. For it he concocted verses, for it he made speeches, for it he <WSD>scintillated</WSD> the brightest sparks of his quiet wit. 
Meaning of the word marked with <WSD> tags:  To throw off like sparks.