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Aggrandizement   Listen
noun
Aggrandizement  n.  The act of aggrandizing, or the state of being aggrandized or exalted in power, rank, honor, or wealth; exaltation; enlargement; as, the emperor seeks only the aggrandizement of his own family.
Synonyms: Augmentation; exaltation; enlargement; advancement; promotion; preferment.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Aggrandizement" Quotes from Famous Books



... property in land will be tested in England, as it has elsewhere been? Assuredly not. Ricardo-Malthusianism tends directly to what is commonly called Communism, and at that point will England arrive, under the system which looks to the consolidation of the land, the aggrandizement of the few, and the destruction of the physical, moral, intellectual, and political powers of the whole body of labourers, abroad ...
— The trade, domestic and foreign • Henry Charles Carey

... conscientiously proceed on the course she has been following. But if it can be shown that there is no ethical basis to her policy of dealing with Coloured races, that humanitarianism as a dominating factor is invariably wanting, and that underlying her present policy is the principle of class aggrandizement, then we may urge her to halt ere it is too late, ...
— Native Life in South Africa, Before and Since • Solomon Tshekisho Plaatje

... in the same manner as the majority of mankind are superstitious, that is to say, by credulity like the people; or through interest like the priest. A voluptuary devoted to his appetites; a debauchee drowned in drunkenness; an ambitious mortal given up to his own schemes of aggrandizement; an intriguer surrounded by his plots; a frivolous, dissipated mortal, absorbed by his gewgaws, addicted to his puerile pursuits, buried in his filthy enjoyments; a loose woman abandoned to her irregular desires; a choice spirit of the day: are these I ...
— The System of Nature, Vol. 2 • Baron D'Holbach

... alliance completed the aggrandizement of the house of Manners. The son of sir Robert, bearing in right of his mother the title of lord Roos, and knighted by the earl of Surry for his distinguished bravery in the Scottish wars, was honored with the hand of Anne sole heiress of sir Thomas St. Leger by the duchess-dowager of ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin

... unlawful combination was not confined to the ocean; the Indian tribes have constituted the effective force in Florida. With these tribes these adventurers had formed at an early period a connection with a view to avail themselves of that force to promote their own projects of accumulation and aggrandizement. It is to the interference of some of these adventurers, in misrepresenting the claims and titles of the Indians to land and in practicing on their savage propensities, that the Seminole war is principally ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various

... trodden grass, and gazed on the ruin of the abode that had once almost oppressed her with its grandeur. Past away! and with it, she whose hopes and schemes were set on the aggrandizement of the family—she had gone where earthly greatness was weighed in its true balance! And the lime trees budded, new and young in their spring greenness, as ...
— Heartsease - or Brother's Wife • Charlotte M. Yonge

... same thing as a coalition of nations in two hostile groups, the one standing on the defensive against the warlike machinations of the other, and both groups bidding for the favor of those minor Powers whose traditions and current aspirations run to national (dynastic) aggrandizement by way of political intrigue. It would come to a more articulate and accentuated form of that balance of power that has latterly gone bankrupt in Europe, with the most corrupt and unreliable petty ...
— An Inquiry Into The Nature Of Peace And The Terms Of Its Perpetuation • Thorstein Veblen

... us that makes wars possible. It is because we have in every nation, and in every class, multitudes of men and women who neglect the service of their fellow-creatures in a desire for self-indulgence and self-aggrandizement, that this catastrophe has fallen upon us all. It is a case of devil-possession, and our only hope is to exorcise ourselves of the evil spirit. Our avowed intention is to cast out 'Kaiserism' in ...
— With Our Soldiers in France • Sherwood Eddy

... Darringtons? Suppose that he knew that Mrs. Brentano and her daughter would inherit a large fortune, if Gen'l Darrington died intestate? If he had wooed and won the heart of the daughter, and believed that her rights had been sacrificed to promote the aggrandizement of an alien, the adopted step-son Prince, had not such a man, the accepted lover of the daughter, a personal interest in the provisions of a will which disinherited Mrs. Brentano, and her child? Have you not now, motive, means, and opportunity, and links of evidence that point to this man ...
— At the Mercy of Tiberius • August Evans Wilson

... viceroy, abandoned his intention of helping Ariobarzanes, but sat down before Samos, relieved it, and set it free. {10} And to this day no war has ever arisen to trouble you on account of this. For to enter upon a war for the purpose of aggrandizement is never the same thing as to do so in defence of one's own possessions. Every one fights his hardest to recover what he has lost; but when men endeavour to gain at the expense of others, it is not so. They desire to do this, if it is allowed ...
— The Public Orations of Demosthenes, volume 1 • Demosthenes

... seen the way that the sunlight struck its towers, he would proclaim himself King there, and then ride on in fancy. So he passed from city to city and from land to land. Clear-sighted though Mr. Shap was, I think he overlooked the lust of aggrandizement to which kings have so often been victims; and so it was that when the first few cities had opened their gleaming gates and he saw peoples prostrate before his camel, and spearmen cheering along countless balconies, and priests come out to do him reverence, ...
— The Book of Wonder • Edward J. M. D. Plunkett, Lord Dunsany

... the public. Honest business is more really a contribution to the public than it is to the manager of the business himself. Although it seems to the man, and generally to the community, that the active business man is a self-seeker, and although his motive may be self-aggrandizement, yet, in point of fact, no man ever manages a legitimate business in this life, that he is not doing a thousand-fold more for other men than he is trying to do even for himself. For, in the economy of God's ...
— Great Fortunes, and How They Were Made • James D. McCabe, Jr.

... each other, but after much fighting they made peace on a basis of alliance against the pope. Thus further weakened, he felt more than ever that he had only his own kin to rely upon, and his thoughts were ever turned on family aggrandizement. He had annulled Lucrezia's marriage with Sforza in 1497, and, unable to arrange a union between Cesare and the daughter of Frederick, king of Naples (who had succeeded Ferdinand II. the previous year), he induced the latter by threats to agree to a marriage between the duke of Bisceglie, a natural ...
— Project Gutenberg Encyclopedia

... physical beauty, the wisdom of his replies to the puzzling questions of the Pharisees and the Sadducces, his sympathy with the poor and the needy, his ambition for all that is best in human development, and his indifference to worldly aggrandizement, altogether made him a marked man in his day and generation. For these reasons he was hated, reviled, persecuted, like the long line of martyrs who followed his teachings. He commands far more love and reverence as a ...
— The Woman's Bible. • Elizabeth Cady Stanton

... of the Church, he learned that Gondebaud, disquieted, no doubt, at the conversion of his powerful neighbor, had just made a vain attempt, at a conference held at Lyons, to reconcile in his kingdom the Catholics and the Arians. Clovis considered the moment favorable to his projects of aggrandizement at the expense of the Burgundian king; he fomented the dissensions which already prevailed between Gondebaud and his brother Godegisile, assured to himself the latter's complicity, and suddenly entered Burgundy with his army. ...
— A Popular History of France From The Earliest Times - Volume I. of VI. • Francois Pierre Guillaume Guizot

... no sooner alone, than He gave free loose to the indulgence of his vanity. When He remembered the Enthusiasm which his discourse had excited, his heart swelled with rapture, and his imagination presented him with splendid visions of aggrandizement. He looked round him with exultation, and Pride told him loudly that He was superior to the rest of ...
— The Monk; a romance • M. G. Lewis

... hundred and fifty years. There was but little amalgamation between them and their military masters. Britain was a most valuable northern outpost of the Roman Empire, and was occupied by large garrisons, which employed the people in hard labors, and used them for Roman aggrandizement, but despised them too much to attempt to elevate their condition. Elsewhere the Romans depopulated, where they met with barbarian resistance; they made a solitude and called it peace—for which they gave a triumph and a cognomen to the conqueror; but ...
— English Literature, Considered as an Interpreter of English History - Designed as a Manual of Instruction • Henry Coppee

... this long frontier? Will no slaves run away? What is to be gained by a dissolution of the Union? Not peace; for if, when united, there exists such cause of dissension, the evil will be tenfold greater when separated. Not national aggrandizement, for division brings weakness, imbecility, and a loss of self-respect; it invites aggressions from foreign powers, and compels to submission to insults that otherwise would not be given. Not general competence, for the South is quite as dependent upon the North ...
— Continental Monthly, Vol. II. July, 1862. No. 1. • Various

... self-confident swimmer who had been caught by the tide and was being swept irresistibly out to sea. Blurred though her vision was, she seemed to see things clearer than she had ever seen them before, and she somehow felt that the fate which had overtaken her was the result of self-aggrandizement—that she in a measure typified the passing or end of a condition out of whose decay the ...
— When Dreams Come True • Ritter Brown

... Therefore Bakunin repudiates the State as synonymous with the surrender of the liberty of the individual or small minorities,—the destruction of social relationship, the curtailment, or complete denial even, of life itself, for its own aggrandizement. The State is the altar of political freedom and, like the religious altar, it is maintained for the ...
— Anarchism and Other Essays • Emma Goldman

... cause and how a large proportion of our people were prepared to go to war after the sinking of the Lusitania for an object which could bring them no territorial reward. If we will fight only for money and aggrandizement, as the "Uncle Sham" style of reasoners hold, we should long ago have taken Mexico and Central America. Personally, I have never had anyone say to me that I was "too proud to fight," though if I went about ...
— My Second Year of the War • Frederick Palmer

... Such would be the result of their ambition; for it is the curse of injustice that it brings with it sooner or later its own punishment. Happily for the colony the realization of their projects depends not upon themselves; and his Majesty's ministers will not lend their sanction to schemes of private aggrandizement, which can only be accomplished by the sacrifice of the public good. If these men have not themselves the sagacity to dive into futurity, and to foresee the dangers and contests to which unjust privileges and ...
— Statistical, Historical and Political Description of the Colony of New South Wales and its Dependent Settlements in Van Diemen's Land • William Charles Wentworth

... acquire new territory in consequence of an understanding with France, she must be sure that no such right of aggrandizement should be granted to Prussia," said Count ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach

... stringent conditions. So long as Belgium—under some form of self-government—is under German sway there is no hope of revenge of France, and the conviction prevails here that after this war France will abstain from her dreams of aggrandizement and become pacific. Germany can then make reductions in the burdens laid on her people ...
— New York Times Current History: The European War, Vol 2, No. 1, April, 1915 - April-September, 1915 • Various

... the Duke discovered that his daughter was in love with a young military officer whose name I don't remember, and that an elopement had been planned to take place the next night. The fury and dismay of the old autocrat passed belief; he saw in a flash the downfall of all his hopes of family aggrandizement through union with the royal house, and, knowing well the spirit of his daughter, despaired of ever bringing her to subjection. Nevertheless, he attacked her unmercifully, and, by bullying and threats, by imprisonment, and even ...
— Black Spirits and White - A Book of Ghost Stories • Ralph Adams Cram

... science and the beginnings of actual knowledge, it inspired their minds with a sense of power, and gave form to their lives and customs. We have no reason to suppose that the early magicians and medicine-men were peculiarly wicked or bent on mere self-aggrandizement—any more than we have to think the same of the average country vicar or country doctor of to-day. They were merely men a trifle wiser or more instructed than their flocks. But though probably in most cases their original intentions were decent enough, they were not proof against the temptations ...
— Pagan & Christian Creeds - Their Origin and Meaning • Edward Carpenter

... the Nazi movement embodies an antidemocratic tradition which National Socialism has utilized, reduced to simple but relentless terms, and exploited in what is known as the National Socialist Weltanschauung for the greater aggrandizement of Nazi Germany. The complete agreement between the Nazi ideology and the previously described political concepts of the past is revealed in the forthcoming exposition of the main ...
— Readings on Fascism and National Socialism • Various

... refused to negotiate with him in a character which England could not acknowledge; but intimated that if France was desirous of maintaining peace with Great Britain, she must renounce her views of aggression and aggrandizement, and confine herself to her own territory, without insulting other Governments, without disturbing their tranquillity, without ...
— Memoirs of the Court and Cabinets of George the Third, Volume 2 (of 2) - From the Original Family Documents • The Duke of Buckingham

... the midst of this chaos there were principles at work which reduced things to a certain form, and gradually unfolded a system in which the chief movers and main springs were the Papal and the Imperial powers,—the aggrandizement or diminution of which have been the drift of almost all the politics, intrigues, and wars which have employed and ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. VII. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... of the Virginia Company of London and of the English public which gave it sanction were profit for the investors and aggrandizement for the nation, along with the reduction of pauperism at home and the conversion of the heathen abroad. For income the original promoters looked mainly toward a South Sea passage, gold mines, fisheries, Indian ...
— American Negro Slavery - A Survey of the Supply, Employment and Control of Negro Labor as Determined by the Plantation Regime • Ulrich Bonnell Phillips

... end, but many came forward to essay their strength; the equivocal assistance of an over-powerful protector, gave place to a more noble self-exertion on the part of the Estates; and those who were formerly the mere instruments of his aggrandizement, now began to work for themselves. They now looked to their own exertions for the emancipation, which could not be received without danger from the hand of the mighty; and the Swedish power, now incapable of sinking ...
— The Works of Frederich Schiller in English • Frederich Schiller

... artificially deprived of the very position assigned to her by nature in the great tides of commercial intercourse. It is not only the geographical situation and the trade and wealth of Ireland that England has laid hands on for her own aggrandizement, but she has also appropriated to her own ends the physical manhood of the island. Just as the commerce has been forcibly annexed and diverted from its natural trend, so the youth of Ireland has been ...
— The Crime Against Europe - A Possible Outcome of the War of 1914 • Roger Casement

... wealth from the insecurity and possible danger arising from a further Russian advance across the intervening space that the frontier which I am about to describe has been traced and fortified. Politicians of all parties have agreed that, while the territorial aggrandizement of Russia is permissible over regions where she replaces barbarism even by a crude civilization, there can be no excuse for allowing her to take up a position in territories acknowledging our sway, where she can directly menace British interests in India, or indirectly impose an excessive ...
— Modern India • William Eleroy Curtis

... incidents," he at last became aware that the Father was saying to close, "which strikingly illustrate the need of implicit obedience. If the church were a simple organization of man, if it were for the accomplishment of worldly ends, if its object were the aggrandizement of individuals, nothing could be more dangerous than the establishment in it of what seems like arbitrary power. As it is directed from above; as its aim is nothing less than the spiritual uplifting of the race; as, indeed, upon it rests the salvation, ...
— The Puritans • Arlo Bates

... in the war in the instigation of which she is charged with being so deeply involved? Territorial aggrandizement may have been one of her purposes. Belgium and Holland lay between her and the open Atlantic, and the possession of these countries, with their splendid ports, would pay her well for a reasonable degree of risk and cost. The invasion ...
— A History of The Nations and Empires Involved and a Study - of the Events Culminating in The Great Conflict • Logan Marshall

... disapprovals that have become socially habitual. When we speak of a country being imperialistic or materialistic, we mean that most individuals in it, or at least those who are articulate or influential, perform or approve of actions leading to national or individual aggrandizement. The amount of money, time, and energy that is spent on amusement, public works, education, the army and navy is a fairly accurate gauge of the relative group approvals they have respectively secured. In the same way the professions and occupations in which ...
— Human Traits and their Social Significance • Irwin Edman

... is France, who would never consent to so striking an aggrandizement of the house of Austria, and can not passively submit to see it spread itself so ...
— The Youth of the Great Elector • L. Muhlbach

... possibility of further concealment. The lovers were in an agony of fear and terror. Though beloved by her father, she had no reason to hope that he would so far forget his dignity and the honour of his family, and so far sacrifice his views of aggrandizement, as to admit into his family a man who was neither hunter nor warrior, and whose want of qualifications would have ensured his rejection by families of ordinary note—how much more from that of a proud and haughty chief! Love conquers the strongest; and, rather than be separated, ...
— Traditions of the North American Indians, Vol. 2 (of 3) • James Athearn Jones

... 1829 (No. 18), Harrison states that the monarchists are determined to put Bolvar on the throne, and adds that he saw a letter of "a man in high position who has enjoyed the entire confidence of Bolvar, but who is now in complete opposition to all his schemes of personal aggrandizement." Bolvar, according to this letter, intended to become the monarch of Colombia, Per and Bolivia. Then Harrison mentions the printing of a paper on the evils of free government, and states that ...
— Simon Bolivar, the Liberator • Guillermo A. Sherwell

... when the Holy Alliance laid down the law to Europe, and averted the danger to which the Ottoman Empire, as well as the peace of the world, had been exposed by the combination of French with Russian schemes of aggrandizement. If Canning, left without an ally in Europe, had called the new world into existence to redress the balance of the old, his Whig successors might well look with some satisfaction on that shifting of the weights which had brought ...
— History of Modern Europe 1792-1878 • C. A. Fyffe

... hated. His government was tyrannical. His style of living was so extravagant that his expenses were enormous, and the people were taxed beyond endurance to raise the money required. While, however, he thus spared no expense to secure his own personal aggrandizement and glory, it was generally believed that he cared little for the substantial interests of the country, but was ready to sacrifice them at any time to promote ...
— Richard II - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... gratitude, offered—as far as they could—themselves for subjects of our king, and made their request to his Sicilian Majesty; but both Sir William Hamilton and myself, knowing that no views of individual aggrandizement actuate the breast of our gracious sovereign, have invariably refused every offer of that nature: but, in the present situation of his Sicilian Majesty, and by his desire, his colours and the British flag fly together, to mark that Great Britain ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. II (of 2) • James Harrison

... inculpate it indirectly in his outrages and violations. Convinced, as he thought, of the selfishness which guided all its resolutions, all his attacks and invasions against the law of nations, or independence of States, were either preceded or followed with some offers of aggrandizement, of indemnity, of subsidy, or of alliance. His political intriguers were generally more successful in Prussia than his military heroes in crossing the Rhine or the Elbe, in laying the Hanse Towns under contribution, or in occupying Hanover; or, rather, all these acts of violence and ...
— Memoirs of the Court of St. Cloud, Complete - Being Secret Letters from a Gentleman at Paris to a Nobleman in London • Lewis Goldsmith

... whom I speak. The affections, nay, the very passions of the baron were centered in this boy. It is supposed pride and ambition were their origin, for he looked, through his near connection with the sovereign, for further aggrandizement for himself. There were some who declared ambition was not the master-passion, that a deeper, sterner, fiercer emotion dwelt within. Whether they spoke thus from the sequel, I know not, but that ...
— The Days of Bruce Vol 1 - A Story from Scottish History • Grace Aguilar

... from democracy and revolution. No man ever trusted more entirely to popular opinion than Cicero, or was more anxious for aristocratic authority. But neither in one direction nor the other did he look for personal aggrandizement, beyond that which might come to him in accordance with the law and in subjection to the old form ...
— Life of Cicero - Volume One • Anthony Trollope

... which I have been the blessed means of doing for the Empire, I earnestly wish that she should remember, that though the sword of Alexius hath not slept in its sheath, yet he hath never sought his own aggrandizement of fame at the price ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott

... both of Charles and of Clarendon. Before Clarendon's fall came, the triumph of Lauderdale over his rivals was assured; but before Clarendon's life ended he might have learned to what a height of self-aggrandizement, and of unscrupulous oppression, the popular wiles of that astute tactician had helped him to attain. Had Clarendon been blessed with agents wiser than Middleton and more honest than Archbishop Sharp, the Government of Scotland might have been consolidated; the ...
— The Life of Edward Earl of Clarendon V2 • Henry Craik

... effect that "in the period of corruption in the evolution of societies we are apt to overlook the fact that the energy which in more primitive times marked the operations of a community as a whole has now simply been transferred to the individuals themselves, and this aggrandizement of the individual really produces an even greater amount of energy." And further, Ellis: "All art is the rising and falling of the slopes of a rhythmic curve between these two classic and decadent extremes. Decadence suggests to us going down, ...
— Chopin: The Man and His Music • James Huneker

... French vermin, Montholieu and partner, cheated you with their new loans.' Pfui!—'Nothing touched me so much [continues his Majesty, verging towards the pathetic], as that you had not any trust in me. All this that I was doing for aggrandizement of the House, the Army and Finances, could only be for you, if you made yourself worthy of it! I here declare I have done all things to gain your friendship;—and all has been in vain!' At which words the Crown-Prince, with a very sorrowful gesture, threw himself at his Majesty's ...
— History Of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. VIII. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle

... was senza parentado—without any backing of relationship or allies—i.e., sonless, with no one to come after him. How little likely then was an old man to embark on such a desperate venture for self-aggrandizement merely. He had, indeed, a nephew who was involved in his fate, but apparently not so deeply as to expose him to the last penalty ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various

... moment indeed the two German powers were far from wishing honestly for the suppression of the Republic and the re-establishment of a strong monarchy in France. Such a restoration would have foiled their projects of aggrandizement in Eastern Europe. The strife on the Rhine had set Russia free, as Pitt had foreseen, to carry out her schemes of aggression; and Austria and Prussia saw themselves forced, in the interest of a balance of power, to share in her annexations ...
— History of the English People, Volume VIII (of 8) - Modern England, 1760-1815 • John Richard Green

... would never have beheld a Conde or a Coligny at their head. Without the exaction of the tenth and the twentieth penny, the See of Rome had never lost the United Netherlands. Princes fought in self-defence or for aggrandizement, while religious enthusiasm recruited their armies, and opened to them the treasures of their subjects. Of the multitude who flocked to their standards, such as were not lured by the hope of plunder imagined they were fighting for the truth, while in fact they ...
— The History of the Thirty Years' War • Friedrich Schiller, Translated by Rev. A. J. W. Morrison, M.A.

... war of Louis XIV. Conquest of Flanders Its iniquity Invasion of Holland Easy victories Rise of William of Nassau Prevents the conquest of Holland Peace of Nimeguen Louis in the zenith of power His aggrandizement His palaces His court His mistresses His friendship with Madame de Maintenon Elevation of Maintenon Religious persecution Revocation of the Edict of Nantes Coalition against Louis XIV. Unfortunate wars Humiliation His death Effects of his reign ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume VIII • John Lord

... throughout honest, and the King's and Guizot's the contrary. How the King can wantonly throw away the friendship of one who has stood by him with such sincere affection, for a doubtful object of personal and family aggrandizement, is to me and to the whole country inexplicable. Have confidence in him I fear I never can again, and Peel, who is here on a visit, says a war may arise any moment, once that the good understanding is disturbed; think, then, that the King has done this in ...
— The Letters of Queen Victoria, Vol 2 (of 3), 1844-1853 • Queen Victoria

... the French possessions which soon followed resulted in the grouping together of the various states of Europe into vast empires whose relations with our country are such that encroachment or territorial aggrandizement upon this hemisphere are forever impossible. Spain, whose waning power was then apparent, was no longer a menace, and thus rendered possible the acquisition of the remaining stretch of territory which made ...
— New York at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, St. Louis 1904 - Report of the New York State Commission • DeLancey M. Ellis

... contract already, he would never dream of applying for another. Then, Wilson's malice was gratified by the thought that Gourlay, who hated him, should have to serve, as helper and underling, in a scheme for his aggrandizement. That would take down his pride for him! And the commercial imagination, so strong in Wilson, was inflamed by the vision of himself as a wealthy houseowner which Gibson put before him. Cunning Johnny knew all this when he broached the scheme—he foresaw the pull of it on Wilson's nature. ...
— The House with the Green Shutters • George Douglas Brown

... The fact that he was of a good family only rendered his alliance with "niggers" against his own race and class the more infamous. The fact that he was a man of substantial means, and had sought no office or aggrandizement by the votes of colored men, made his offence the more heinous, because he could not even plead the poor excuse of self-interest. The fact that he had served the Confederacy well, and bore on his person ...
— Bricks Without Straw • Albion W. Tourgee

... extraordinary natural ability and as extraordinary learning. He had been universally trusted and honored in his day, but had finally, fallen into misfortune; while serving his third term in Congress, and while upon the point of being elevated to the Senate—which was considered the summit of earthly aggrandizement in those days—he had yielded to temptation, when in distress for money wherewith to save his estate; and sold his vote. His crime was discovered, and his fall followed instantly. Nothing could reinstate him in the confidence of the people, his ruin was ...
— The Gilded Age, Part 2. • Mark Twain (Samuel Clemens) and Charles Dudley Warner

... States have no enmities, animosities, or rivalries, and no interests which conflict with the welfare, safety, and rights or interests of any other nation. Their own prosperity, happiness, and aggrandizement are sought most safely and advantageously through the preservation not only of peace on their own part, but peace among all other nations. But while the United States are thus a friend to all other nations, they do not seek to conceal the fact that they cherish especial sentiments ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln

... recognized and received as the undoubted heir to his father's throne; a few years later he would, to a certainty, be looked at askance as a mere pretender—a pawn in the game of some unscrupulous king-maker playing for his own aggrandizement. ...
— Tales of Destiny • Edmund Mitchell

... passed to his son-in-law, who already held, among other possessions, the counties of Chteau-Thierry and Meaux. His son, in turn, inherited all three counties and increased his dominions by judicious usurpations. This process of gradual aggrandizement went on for generation after generation, until there came to be a compact district under the control of the counts of Champagne, as they began to call themselves at the opening of the twelfth century. It was in this way that the feudal states in France and Germany grew up. Certain lines of feudal ...
— An Introduction to the History of Western Europe • James Harvey Robinson

... southern part of the great basin through which the Tiber finds its way to the sea, between Etruria and Campania.] afforded him the first pretext, by plundering each other's lands. The Albans were ready to settle the difficulty in a peaceful manner, but Tullus, determined upon aggrandizement, refused all overtures. It was much like a civil war, for both nations were of Trojan origin, according to the traditions. The Albans pitched their tents within five miles of Rome, and built a trench about the city. The armies were drawn up ready for battle, ...
— The Story of Rome From the Earliest Times to the End of the Republic • Arthur Gilman

... those who were engaged in commerce with the natives, too frequently prompted them to take every advantage, for self aggrandizement, which they could obtain over the Indians. In the lucrative traffic carried on with them, the influence of honesty was not predominant—the real value of the commodity procured, was never allowed; while upon every article given in exchange, extortion alone affixed the price. These examples ...
— Chronicles of Border Warfare • Alexander Scott Withers

... continue their life indefinitely and increase their strength to an unbelievable degree. If the original personality was evil, the beings attracted to the left-over forces will also be evil. In this case, I think there has been an unusual and dreadful aggrandizement of the thoughts and purposes left behind long ago by a woman of consummate wickedness and great personal power of character and intellect. Now, do you begin to see what I am ...
— Lords of the Housetops - Thirteen Cat Tales • Various

... energies—to rescue its financial concerns from the desperate condition in which he found them. With an immediate and perspective increase of expenditure that was perfectly frightful—in the meditation and actual prosecution of vast but useless enterprises—of foreign interference and aggrandizement, to secure a little longer continuance of popular favour, they deliberately destroyed a principal source of revenue, by the reduction of the postage duties, in defiance of the repeated protests and warnings of Sir Robert Peel, when in Opposition. They had, in fact, brought matters to such a pitch, ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. 327 - Vol. 53, January, 1843 • Various

... not necessarily imply a great measure. This proposal of Sir Robert Peel does not, as far as we can see, embody any principle; it merely surrenders the interests of one class for the apparent aggrandizement of another. We use the word "apparent" advisedly; for, looking to the nature and the extent of home consumption, we believe that the effects of the measure would ultimately be felt most severely by the manufacturers themselves. The agriculturist ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 365, March, 1846 • Various

... commercial strength. We still draw from their stores of wealth commercially, spiritually, intellectually, and physically, and we are beginning to return, in rich measure, with interest, what we have got from them. We have learned that national aggrandizement and national prosperity are to be gained rather by national friendship than by national violence. The friendship for your country that we from the North have is a friendship that imperils no interest of Europe. It is a friendship that springs from a desire to promote the common welfare of ...
— Latin America and the United States - Addresses by Elihu Root • Elihu Root

... between England and France arose out of the King's proclamation against seditious writings, which we noticed in the last chapter. Chauvelin complained of some of its phrases, and stated that France waged war for national safety, not for aggrandizement. Grenville thereupon loftily remarked that Chauvelin had no right to express an opinion on a question which concerned solely the King's Government and Parliament. The British reply irritated by its ...
— William Pitt and the Great War • John Holland Rose

... welfare, and the will and power of the government to the contrary notwithstanding—is a total perversion of its whole intent. The design of the provision, was to throw up a barrier against Governmental aggrandizement. The right to "take property" for State uses is one thing;—the right so to adjust the tenures by which property is held, that each may have his own secured to him, is another thing, and clearly within the scope of legislation. Besides, if Congress ...
— The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Omnibus • American Anti-Slavery Society

... added, "My country's wars have always been for Freedom and Righteousness, never for aggrandizement. A nation's sentiments will animate her citizens. I heard rumors of a sister country in distress and longed to help her. I heard rumors. I find them confirmed. I am no spy. ...
— Trusia - A Princess of Krovitch • Davis Brinton

... by a mercenary band, who, while they offer adulation to your system of error, are ready at the first favorable moment to forsake and desert you. A portion of them are needy young men, who without maturely investigating the consequence, have sacrificed principle to self-aggrandizement. Others are mere parasites, that well know the tenure on which they hold their offices, and will ever pay implicit obedience to those who administer to their wants. Many of your followers are among the most profligate of the community. They are the bane of social and domestic happiness, senile ...
— The Boss and the Machine • Samuel P. Orth

... Allen! With the strange infatuation of a worldly mind, she was turning to the world, and it alone, for hope and solace. Untaught by the wretched experience of the past, she was led to enter upon a new and similar scheme for the aggrandizement of her family, as will ...
— What Can She Do? • Edward Payson Roe

... For my own part, Sir Richard, when I have reflected how many of my loyal and devoted friends perished by the sword and by proscription, or died indigent and neglected in a foreign land, I have often, sworn that no view to my personal aggrandizement should again induce me to agitate a title which has cost my followers so dear. But since so many men of worth and honour conceive the cause of England and Scotland to be linked with that of Charles Stuart, I must follow their brave example, and, laying aside all other considerations, ...
— Redgauntlet • Sir Walter Scott

... religion of the empire, was obliged to adopt some form of internal policy, and to appoint a sufficient number of ministers, intrusted not only with the spiritual functions, but even with the temporal direction of the Christian commonwealth. The safety of that society, its honor, its aggrandizement, were productive, even in the most pious minds, of a spirit of patriotism, such as the first of the Romans had felt for the republic, and sometimes of a similar indifference, in the use of whatever means ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 1 • Edward Gibbon

... years and custom—the unconscious deference to the opinion of those whom our youth has been taught to venerate, can alone suffice to tame down an enterprising and grasping mind to objects of public advantage, in preference to designs for individual aggrandizement: influence of such a nature had never operated upon the views and faculties of the hero of Marathon. Habituated to the enjoyment of absolute command, he seemed incapable of the duties of civil subordination; and the custom of a life urged him onto the ...
— Athens: Its Rise and Fall, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... other denominations must rest on the spirit of Christ calling us together. It cannot come from any other source. Popularity, self aggrandizement, aught that can darken in any degree our spirituality, must be set aside. Only what feeds and fills the sentiment with unworldliness, can give peace and ...
— Pulpit and Press (6th Edition) • Mary Baker Eddy

... races. Every page, nay, almost every line, in his journals and letters, bears witness to his profound compassion for the despised and downtrodden Dyaks. Aside from this, when we remember that he was a genuine Englishman, proud of his native land and thoughtful always of her aggrandizement, we need be at no loss to understand his motives. He went forth to gratify a love of adventure, "to see something of the world and come back again," to extend a little the realms of scientific knowledge, to suggest, perhaps, some plans for the improvement of native character, and ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 110, December, 1866 - A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics • Various

... way to that of domination. Conscious of power, men sought to exercise it, not on themselves but on one another. Little by little this meant aggression, suppression, plunder, struggle, glory and all that goes with the pomp and circumstance of war. So the individuality in the mass was lost in the aggrandizement of the few. Independence was swallowed up in ambition and patriotism came to have a new meaning, being transferred from hearth and home to the camp and ...
— Popular Science Monthly Volume 86

... of the orator and brother-in-law of T. Pomponius Atticus, was born about 102 B.C. He was aedile in 67, praetor in 62, and for the three following years propraetor in Asia, where, though he seems to have abstained from personal aggrandizement, his profligacy and ill-temper gained him an evil notoriety. After his return to Rome, he heartily supported the attempt to secure his brother's recall from exile, and was nearly murdered by gladiators in the pay of P. Clodius Pulcher. He distinguished ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various

... D. Neill, who has excelled other writers in patient and exact study of the original sources of this part of colonial history, characterizes Cecilius, second Lord Baltimore, as "one whose whole life was passed in self-aggrandizement, first deserting Father White, then Charles I., and making friends of Puritans and republicans to secure the rentals of the province of Maryland, and never contributing a penny for a church or school-house" ("English Colonization ...
— A History of American Christianity • Leonard Woolsey Bacon

... civilization of the Greeks. "It cannot be doubted," says GROTE, "that these first two centuries were periods of steady increase among the Sicilian Greeks, undisturbed by those distractions and calamities which supervened afterward, and which led indeed to the extraordinary aggrandizement of some of their communities, but also to the ruin of several others; moreover, it seems that the Carthaginians in Sicily gave them no trouble until the time of Ge'lon. Their position will seem singularly advantageous, if we consider the extraordinary ...
— Mosaics of Grecian History • Marcius Willson and Robert Pierpont Willson

... she did not notice much the things that lay immediately around her. In brilliant conversation with poets, wits, and statesmen, in sympathy with the toils of her husband or proud schemes for his aggrandizement, Lady Ellinor lived a life of excitement. Those large, eager, shining eyes of hers, bright with some feverish discontent, looked far abroad, as if for new worlds to conquer; the world at her feet escaped from her vision. She loved her daughter, she ...
— The Caxtons, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... our religion is based on superstitious belief in lies that have been foisted upon us for ages by those directly above us, to whose personal profit and aggrandizement it was to have us continue to believe as they ...
— The Gods of Mars • Edgar Rice Burroughs

... the same purpose in a different way; and instead of leaving the troops, according to the intention and policy of the Council, as a check to the ambition and progress of the Mahrattas, he proposed to employ them in the actual furtherance of those schemes of aggrandizement of which his colleagues were jealous, and which it was the object of their resolution ...
— The Works Of The Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. IX. (of 12) • Edmund Burke

... His philosophy rather despised, than inclined to, show. Yet since to plot and to scheme made his sole amusement, his absorbing excitement, so a man wrapped in himself, and with no generous ends in view, has little to plot or to scheme for but objects of worldly aggrandizement. In this Dalibard resembled one whom the intoxication of gambling has mastered, who neither wants nor greatly prizes the stake, but who has grown wedded to the venture for it. It was a madness like that of a certain ...
— Lucretia, Complete • Edward Bulwer-Lytton

... upon humanity, which refused to see evil or to condemn where formerly he had been noted for his zeal in bringing to condemnation all whom he believed to be heretics; his conviction of immortality; his humility, as far as personal aggrandizement was concerned; the great light in which was revealed to him the truth; the annihilation of the idea of sin and death; the realization that systems and laws and methods of worship and giving of alms and all the by-paths which formerly he had deemed necessary, ...
— Cosmic Consciousness • Ali Nomad

... the rupture with England, Alexander had the mortification of seeing his worst fears realized. Napoleon had opened to him at Tilsit a dazzling vista of territorial aggrandizement. Slowly but surely the desired effect was produced. Aware of all the dangers he ran, the Czar nevertheless sacrificed every other consideration, even that of his people's material comfort, in order to demonstrate his good faith. By declaring war he likewise paid in advance. But at the earliest ...
— The Life of Napoleon Bonaparte - Vol. III. (of IV.) • William Milligan Sloane

... And who wouldn't? Young Hall is no fit mate for Florence Lloyd. He's a fortune-hunter. I know the man, and his only ambition is the aggrandizement of his ...
— The Gold Bag • Carolyn Wells

... continued to embarrass and thwart the other proprietors by his various wild schemes for self-aggrandizement. As Mr. Kendall said in a letter of August 4: "There is much Fog in Smith's letter, but it is ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume II • Samuel F. B. Morse

... minds of the community that these vultures are constantly preying upon the wealth and resources of the country; they are a class, as it were, of money jugglers intent only on practising their trickery for self aggrandizement, and that, consequently, their greed leads them into all known ways and byways of fraud, scheming, and speculating, to accomplish the amassing of princely fortunes." These intemperate utterances were the first seeds ...
— A Short History of Pittsburgh • Samuel Harden Church

... clipping mechanically many times before he handed it back. There was more in it to him than the withholding of credit which belonged to an obscure old man, or the self-aggrandizement of a pompous braggart. To Bruce it was indicative of a man with a moral screw loose, it denoted a laxity of principle. With his own direct standards of conduct it was equivalent ...
— The Man from the Bitter Roots • Caroline Lockhart

... not complete. The ten millions of Austrian Germans were, when Prussia achieved this her highest ambition, deliberately left outside the new German Empire. And this was done because, in Prussian eyes, a so-called "German unity" was but a means to an end, and that end the aggrandizement of the Hohenzollern dynasty. To include so many southern and Catholic Germans would have endangered the mastery of Berlin. The fact that Austria ruled a number of non-German subjects far larger than her Austrian population ...
— A General Sketch of the European War - The First Phase • Hilaire Belloc

... of the minority. There is nothing new in this, however, as any cool-headed man may see in this enlightened republic of our own, daily examples in which the majority-principle works purely for the aggrandizement of a minority clique. It makes very little difference how men are ruled; they will be cheated; for, failing of rogues at head-quarters to perform that office for them, they are quite certain to set to work to devise some means of cheating themselves. At the crater ...
— The Crater • James Fenimore Cooper

... and more patience than I usually possess. If I find the press of Memphis actuated by high principle and a sole devotion to their country, I will be their best friend; but, if I find them personal, abusive, dealing in innuendoes and hints at a blind venture, and looking to their own selfish aggrandizement and fame, then they had better look out; for I regard such persons as greater enemies to their country and to mankind than the men who, from a mistaken sense of State pride, have taken up muskets, and fight us about as hard as we care ...
— The Memoirs of General W. T. Sherman, Complete • William T. Sherman

... will continue to extend itself wherever it can find room to spread. He who looks for any other result, must expect that nations, which, for centuries, have waged war to extend their commerce, will now abandon that means of aggrandizement, and bankrupt themselves to force the abolition of ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various

... wonderfully well she knew better than did any one else, and at this date she had fresh cause for self-gratulation. Through her, Herbert, her favorite brother, was likely to form an alliance which would be a timely and substantial stepping-stone to his aggrandizement and wealth. There were more reasons why she should hold her head higher—why the blood should clothe her cheek with a richer carmine, and a smile encircle the mouth, as one swift glance took in the spacious, luxurious room, ...
— At Last • Marion Harland

... ambition, that passion was, in his bosom, so regulated by principles, or controlled by circumstances, that it was neither vicious, nor turbulent. Intrigue was never employed as the means of its gratification, nor was personal aggrandizement its object. The various high and important stations to which he was called by the public voice, were unsought by himself; and, in consenting to fill them, he seems rather to have yielded to a general conviction that the interests of his country would be thereby promoted, ...
— The Life of George Washington, Vol. 5 (of 5) • John Marshall

... stolid adherents of Katkoff as men lacking in patriotism. Between these two parties—if we could speak of parties in a country which has no ordered public life—a third group is observable: the Panslavists, many of whom pursue, under a Liberal mask, aims favourable to the aggrandizement of Czardom. Not a few of the Panslavists are in reality mere Government tools. Others, who, like Aksakoff, began as independent workers in the Panslavist cause, finally yielded to Government temptation; but after a while even they were found to be too much imbued ...
— The Contemporary Review, Volume 36, September 1879 • Various

... it suited her purpose. The combat with Mithridates had forced her to become an Asiatic power; and having once overcome her repugnance to being entangled in Asiatic politics, she allowed her instinct of self-aggrandizement to have full play, and reduced the kingdom of the Seleucidae into the form of ...
— History of Phoenicia • George Rawlinson

... Polysperchon the kingdom. This act, though Cassander himself never forgave it, raised Antipater to a higher place than ever in the estimation of mankind. They said that he did what no monarch ever did before; in determining the great question of the succession, he made the aggrandizement of his own family give place to the ...
— Pyrrhus - Makers of History • Jacob Abbott

... ONE'S SELF. The safest method of stirring the emotions is to make an appeal in behalf of the subject, but occasionally a writer or speaker who is truly sincere, who is contending against unfortunate circumstances, and is not seeking personal aggrandizement, may arouse interest by making an appeal on his own behalf. He may present some personal reason why the audience should be interested and give him a respectful hearing; he calls attention not primarily to his subject, but to his ...
— Practical Argumentation • George K. Pattee

... generated by the first, is, that every rebel devotes his whole soul and energy to the success of the rebellion, forcibly forgetting his individuality. Our thus called leaders think first of their little selves, whose aggrandizement the public events are to secure, and the public cause is to square ...
— Diary from March 4, 1861, to November 12, 1862 • Adam Gurowski

... here asking questions of the man. And these questions dig deep into the life of the man and show him how puny and impotent is the finite in the presence of the Infinite. In this presence there is neither pomp, nor parade, nor vaunting, nor self-aggrandizement, nor arrogance. Even the printed page cannot but induce respect, devoutness, and profound reverence, for it tells of nature's wonders—the snow-crystals, the rain, the dewdrop, the light, the cloud, the lightning—and ...
— The Reconstructed School • Francis B. Pearson

... was forced to solicit an armistice. Prince Maurice objected to it, as the continuance of the war was essential to the furtherance of his own ambitious views. On this account, the truce was promoted by Barneveldt and the republican party. They justly thought that the aggrandizement of the house of Orange would be the extinction of the liberties of their country, so that the result of the war would only be, that the United Provinces would change their masters. After a long negotiation, an armistice of twelve years was agreed ...
— The Life of Hugo Grotius • Charles Butler

... duty. This would be the more likely to take place, as the delinquencies of the larger members might be expected sometimes to proceed from an ambitious premeditation in their rulers, with a view to getting rid of all external control upon their designs of personal aggrandizement; the better to effect which it is presumable they would tamper beforehand with leading individuals in the adjacent States. If associates could not be found at home, recourse would be had to the aid of foreign powers, ...
— The Federalist Papers

... there, and was in most, I cannot doubt. We ought not to judge of this community by the leaders of the several divisions which compose it. They are by no means just specimens, from which to infer the character of all. They are but too often restless, ambitious, selfish men; seeking their own aggrandizement and their party's, rather than the glory of Christ and his truth. I can conceive of a reception of Christian precept and of the Christian spirit being but little more perfect and complete, than I have found it among the ...
— Aurelian - or, Rome in the Third Century • William Ware

... assuming that affection played some part in his mother's indignant opposition. Well, dona Bernarda did love him—agreed: he was her only son; but ambition was the decisive thing in her schemes, her passion for the aggrandizement of the House—the controlling motive of her whole life. She was openly, frankly, using him as security in an alliance she was planning with a great fortune. She wanted to marry him to money: and if Leonora were to go, if he were left alone, forsaken, then despair—and ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez

... by reason of the measures he pursues, and this he may do without committing any positive offense against the law, must he preserve his office in despite of the popular will? Suppose him grasping for his own aggrandizement and the elevation of his connections by every means short of the treason defined by the Constitution, hurrying your affairs to the precipice of destruction, endangering your domestic tranquility, plundering you of ...
— History of the Impeachment of Andrew Johnson, • Edumud G. Ross

... little short of a revolution. As the country tasted the sweets of rest and firm government that reaction of feeling, that horror of fresh civil wars, that content with its own internal growth and indifference to foreign aggrandizement, which distinguished the epoch of the Tudors, began to assert its power. The Crown became identified with the thought of national prosperity, almost with the thought of national existence. Loyalty drew to itself the force of patriotism. Devotion to the crown became one ...
— History of the English People, Volume III (of 8) - The Parliament, 1399-1461; The Monarchy 1461-1540 • John Richard Green



Words linked to "Aggrandizement" :   increase, aggrandize, self-aggrandizement, self-aggrandisement, ego trip, elevation



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