"Motive" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... admirably described in Mrs Mark Pattison's volumes on the "Renaissance of Art in France," though the authoress refuses to admit that Michelet's view of Pilon's motive is correct. But in Vol. I. ...
— The Story of Rouen • Sir Theodore Andrea Cook
... a self-evident proposition, that just so far as you alleviate the pressure of guilt upon the consciences of evil doers, you weaken the power of motive to repent, and encourage them to sin with impunity. To descant upon the wrongs of the slave-system, and yet exonerate the supporters of it from reprehension, is to deal in absurdities: we might preach in this manner until the crack of doom, and never gain a convert. Paradoxes may amuse, but ...
— Thoughts on African Colonization • William Lloyd Garrison
... I might see, hear, and be in company with her whom I loved, Antipho. Is {that} a slight motive, or a poor reason? I was presented to {the} woman. She, as soon as she received me, joyfully took me home to her house and intrusted ...
— The Comedies of Terence - Literally Translated into English Prose, with Notes • Publius Terentius Afer, (AKA) Terence
... in bribery of any sort would, I knew, be fatal to my own interests even if I had not been actuated by any higher motive. I placed myself, therefore, in the hands of my friend and principal agent, Mr. Kingston, as well as the ...
— The Reminiscences Of Sir Henry Hawkins (Baron Brampton) • Henry Hawkins Brampton
... relation with God gives men a new motive. Under the law, guilty, condemned by it, the motive was fear. But when men have been redeemed from under the law and adopted as sons of God, the motive of fear is no more the motive of life. "Ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the spirit of ...
— God's Plan with Men • T. T. (Thomas Theodore) Martin
... there are those, and those who are most active and influential in this cause, who hesitate not to say, that they wish to rid the country of the free colored population; and there is sufficient reason to believe that with many, this is the principal motive for supporting that Society; and that whether Africa is civilized or not, and whether the slave-trade be suppressed or not, they would wish to see the free colored people removed from ...
— Thoughts on African Colonization • William Lloyd Garrison
... to be collected, didst thou consume them with the aid of fire? What was the cause of thy sudden journey through my city on the car? What object hadst thou in view in giving away so much wealth? What was thy motive in showing us the wonders of the forest created by the Yoga-puissance? What indeed was thy motive for showing, O great ascetic, so many palatial mansions made of gold and so many bedsteads supported on posts of jewels, and gems? Why also did all these wonders vanish from our sight? I wish to hear ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 4 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... motive in wishing to stand by the tree? What did he expect when he said it was his last hope? During the way up the long, laborious slope, an incident of his early years in connection with the tree had been in his mind, and had wrought ...
— Dead Man's Plack and an Old Thorn • William Henry Hudson
... excavation of the Pennsylvania and Ohio canal, and during the progress of the work they purchased land on either side of the canal, including Lock fourteen, where they built a saw and flouring mill, using the canal water as motive power. Towards the latter part of 1839, Mr. Philpot purchased the interest of Mr. Price in the mills and land, and ran the mills successfully, until 1841, when he sold both mills and land to Colonel Elisha Garrett, of Garrettsville. In the Spring of 1841, ...
— Cleveland Past and Present - Its Representative Men, etc. • Maurice Joblin
... was more dangerous than open and avowed infidelity, since "the one motive of the whole book ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 12 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Scientists • Elbert Hubbard
... were like some, it would be the pleasantest, easiest work imaginable; if all were like others, the veriest torment. It was an excellent place to study human nature, but made me somewhat cynical. My sewing-machine had fits and gave me a back-ache, so I've locked it up until some one invents a motive-power that can be applied to house-work, washing, churning, mincing meat and vegetables, driving sewing-machines, and—if it only could—kneading bread, sweeping floors, washing dishes, ironing clothes, and making beds. My book agency was undertaken for the sake of travel,—of ...
— Homes And How To Make Them • Eugene Gardner
... earliest motive power for vessels; it may be by the broadside in rowlocks abeam, by sweeps on the quarters fore and aft, or by sculling with one oar in the notch of the transom amidships. ...
— The Sailor's Word-Book • William Henry Smyth
... to think that he had proceeded too far; whatever might have been his motive in thus insulting one whom he must have known was a naval officer, or for some reason, he thought fit suddenly to change ...
— The Heir of Kilfinnan - A Tale of the Shore and Ocean • W.H.G. Kingston
... for of course a duty plainly seen would draw us anywhere. My own dearest sisters will be painfully disappointed by any change of plan, only they are too good and kind not to understand the difficulty, not to see the motive. So do you, I am certain. It has been very very painful altogether, this drawing together of life and death. Robert was too enraptured at my safety, and with his little son, and the sudden reaction ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1 of 2) • Frederic G. Kenyon
... spectator to be truly prophetic, as the later peace movement showed, in seeking a motive for the U-53's proceedings. It considered that Germany sought to force the United States to propose peace terms, regardless of whether the Entente Allies were agreeable ...
— The Story of the Great War, Volume VI (of VIII) - History of the European War from Official Sources • Various
... were still conducted in the Highlands by the agents of the Stuart family, and that they considered it necessary, by one terrible example, to overawe the insurrectionary spirit. This I believe to have been the real motive of an execution which otherwise could not have been palliated: and, in the case of Lord Pitsligo, it is quite possible that the zeal of a partisan may have led him to take a step which would not have been ...
— Lays of the Scottish Cavaliers and Other Poems • W.E. Aytoun
... flaw in its construction. He imagined a perpetual circulation of combustible materials, alternately surrendering and regaining chemical energy, the round being kept going by the motive force of the sun's rotation.[1160] This, however, was merely to perch the globe upon a tortoise, while leaving the tortoise in the air. The sun's rotation contains a certain definite amount of mechanical power—enough, according to Lord Kelvin, if directly converted ...
— A Popular History of Astronomy During the Nineteenth Century - Fourth Edition • Agnes M. (Agnes Mary) Clerke
... went on and the croupier monotonously raked in the winnings of the bank, Paul suddenly divined the motive which had induced the lady to come there. Undoubtedly it was the hope that she might win enough to satisfy the cruel demands of ...
— High Noon - A New Sequel to 'Three Weeks' by Elinor Glyn • Anonymous
... gone into that room; some one who wanted pins; and keeping this fact before my eyes, I saw through the motive and actions of the escaping woman. She had on a dress separated at the waist, and finding, perhaps, a spot of blood on the skirt, she conceived the plan of covering it with her petticoat, which was also of silk and undoubtedly as well made as many women's dresses. But the skirt of the ...
— That Affair Next Door • Anna Katharine Green
... the greatest architectural enterprise that had been undertaken at Ripon since the twelfth century, namely, the rebuilding of the nave of the minster. The Transitional nave, it was said, had become ruinous through age and storms, but the real motive for its destruction was probably an ambition to enlarge the building. The enlargement of aisleless churches was usually begun by the addition of a single aisle, and that on the north side (since the south was usually the side of ...
— Bell's Cathedrals: The Cathedral Church of Ripon - A Short History of the Church and a Description of Its Fabric • Cecil Walter Charles Hallett
... we should remember with gentleness the order of society from which our nurses are drawn; and that those who make their duty a study, and are termed professional nurses, have much to endure from the caprice and egotism of their employers; while others are driven to the occupation from the laudable motive of feeding their own children, and who, in fulfilling that object, are too often both selfish and sensual, performing, without further interest than is consistent with their own advantage, ...
— The Book of Household Management • Mrs. Isabella Beeton
... below ground, a shallow-well pump will be perfectly adequate and as it is much less expensive than the more elaborate deep-well pump, we recommend its use if possible. Most plumbers invariably advise the deep-well pump, especially for driven wells. They do this in all honesty and with no ulterior motive. There is always a bare chance that the water level may drop below the suction limit of the shallow pump under abnormal pressure. If it does, an irate customer can descend on the luckless installer of the less ...
— If You're Going to Live in the Country • Thomas H. Ormsbee and Richmond Huntley
... same time, providing a marine force which might be easily made available for the protection of American rights, in the event of a collision with foreign powers. The attainment of this double object was the motive which, in the opinion of Congress, justified the advance of public funds in aid of private enterprise, inasmuch as it was calculated to insure to the country the acquisition of a powerful means of maritime defense, with little ...
— Ocean Steam Navigation and the Ocean Post • Thomas Rainey
... to surrender the Government to Cleveland in March, 1893, for he had been struggling for weeks to conceal the financial weakness of the United States and to avoid a panic. The great surplus that had been a motive for legislation for more than ten years had nearly become a deficit. Continuous prosperity had tempted Congress to make lavish appropriations. The McKinley Bill had reduced the revenue through changes in the sugar schedule. The Pension Bill had used ...
— The New Nation • Frederic L. Paxson
... student of Plato. He laid down this dogma as the necessary basis of any reform by persuasion. There is much virtue in the word "voluntary." In so far as actions are voluntary, the doctrine is self-evident. A voluntary action is accompanied by foresight, and the idea of certain consequences is its motive. A judgment "this is good" or "this is desirable," has preceded the action, and it originates therefore in an opinion however fugitive. In moments of passion my attention is so engrossed by a particular view of the subject that I forget considerations by which I am commonly ...
— Shelley, Godwin and Their Circle • H. N. Brailsford
... my leave, for I had to engage a steward before night. I was amazed at the decision of Colonel Shepard, and I could not help thinking he had some motive for his course which did not appear on the surface. I decided to call upon my father on my way to the wharf, for he was staying at the Carlton with the Tiffanys. I had gone but a few steps before Owen caught up ...
— Up the River - or, Yachting on the Mississippi • Oliver Optic
... the evident neglect in which the poor wife lives ought to be, for her husband, a motive of security. Not at all! His ingenious mania manages to discover in that fact a ...
— Led Astray and The Sphinx - Two Novellas In One Volume • Octave Feuillet
... higher ideals of conduct, learning, manners, and taste; nor stint them of the means necessary to carry those ideals into effect. Hitherto, the supposed direction of ideals—in practice almost none—has been left to religion. But religion as a motive force is at once too personal, too lacking in unanimity, and too specialised to control the educational needs of a modern State; religion, as I understand it, is essentially emotional and individual; when it becomes practical and worldly it strays outside its true ...
— Another Sheaf • John Galsworthy
... rather than to the ultimate profit-making motivation behind the enterprise in which the library is located. On the other hand, section 108 would not excuse reproduction or distribution if there were a commercial motive behind the actual making or distributing of the copies, if multiple copies were made or distributed, or if the photocopying activities were "systematic" in the sense that their aim was to substitute for subscriptions ...
— Reproduction of Copyrighted Works By Educators and Librarians • Library of Congress. Copyright Office.
... gratified with the conduct of the troops and the officers, and supposed the generals, in recognition of my efforts to aid them by increasing their force and munitions, as well as by my abstinence from all interference with them upon the field, would have neither cause nor motive to reflect upon me in their reports, and it was with equal surprise and regret that in this I found myself mistaken. General Johnston, in his report, represented the order to him to make a junction with General Beauregard ...
— The Rise and Fall of the Confederate Government • Jefferson Davis
... very much grieved at the news of Kitty's Escapade, particularly as she could not see what motive she had for running away, and, moreover, trembled to think of the temptations the innocent girl would be exposed to in the metropolis. After tea, when Archie had gone outside to smoke his pipe, and Selina was busy in the kitchen washing the dishes, she spoke to Vandeloup on the ...
— Madame Midas • Fergus Hume
... general feeling of indignation toward any member of the club that had deserted Charlie, if that member could be found, as each one's motive had not been to desert another, but the prudent ...
— The Knights of the White Shield - Up-the-Ladder Club Series, Round One Play • Edward A. Rand
... Alaeddin, hearing these words, was seized with surprise and not knowing the reason of this remained tongue-tied for a time, after which he turned to them and asked, "O assembly, have you naught of knowledge concerning the motive of the royal mandate? Well I wot my soul to be innocent and that I never sinned against king or against kingdom." "O our lord," answered they, "we have no inkling whatever." So Alaeddin alighted from his horse and ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... is another motive more evangelical: Let England be humbled even for the mercy, the most admirable mercy which God hath showed upon so undeserving and evil-deserving a kingdom. See it in this same prophecy, "I will establish my covenant with ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie
... that which leads us to the Bible; which speaks of the love of God in Christ; and which encourages the reader to be holy from a motive of ...
— Fanny, the Flower-Girl • Selina Bunbury
... appears, however, to have resided in that country at the commencement of the 13th century, we may reasonably conclude that she was a native of Normandy. Philip Augustus having made himself master of that province in 1204, many Norman families, whether from regard to affinity, from motive of adventure, or from attachment to the English government, went over to Great Britain, and there established themselves. If this opinion be not adopted, it will be impossible to fix upon any other province ...
— The Lay of Marie • Matilda Betham
... range, of a young man of high impulses but weak determination. In its over-emphasis upon errors of judgment, as well as upon real if exaggerated misdeeds, it has all the crudeness of youth. An almost fantastic self-consciousness is the central motive: it is a matter of question if this be absolutely vicarious. To me it seems that the author himself was at the time confused by the complicated flashing ...
— Life of Robert Browning • William Sharp
... the King, his Majesty would resume into his own hands all the grants made to them by his royal ancestors or himself, as well as enforce payment of debts due to the Crown which had been formerly remitted. From some motive, these articles were allowed, after being made public, to remain a dead letter, until the administration of Darcy, Edward's confidential agent in many important transactions, English and Irish. They were proclaimed with additional emphasis by this deputy, who convoked a Parliament ...
— A Popular History of Ireland - From the earliest period to the emancipation of the Catholics • Thomas D'Arcy McGee
... ceremonies at the royal court might feel at liberty to violate the rules of that etiquette which on all other occasions was the noble lady's most sacred gospel. Etiquette, however, was just now the motive of her intense excitement, and in its interest she was going to fight a battle on that very spot in ...
— LOUISA OF PRUSSIA AND HER TIMES • Louise Muhlbach
... myself open to your fire without fortifying my position," said Jaspar, enjoying, with hearty relish, the discomfiture of the lawyer. "Now, no more of honor to me. I have kept your secret for my own interest, and now you will keep mine from the same motive." ...
— Hatchie, the Guardian Slave; or, The Heiress of Bellevue • Warren T. Ashton
... yesterday, when subjected to the influence of the same threat, inducement, or temptation; because, without grappling the thorny question of free will, we realize that a man's action is never the result of only one stimulus and motive, but is the resultant of many; and we have no reason to expect that he will act in the same way when subjected to the same stimulus, unless we know that the internal and external conditions pertaining to him are also the same. Furthermore, ...
— The Navy as a Fighting Machine • Bradley A. Fiske
... and he seems to be right, that as the action grew warm, the French, by running off to leeward, in their turn, led the English to repeat the same mode of attack;[61] and so we find, at Stromboli, Ruyter giving ground in the same way, though his motive does not appear. Clerk also points out that a necessary corollary of the lee-gage, assumed for tactical reasons, is to aim at the assailant's spars, his motive power, so that his attack cannot be pushed farther than the ...
— The Influence of Sea Power Upon History, 1660-1783 • A. T. Mahan
... there were the two great motives of fear and love. The motive of fear was as great as the motive of love. Christianity accepted crucifixion to escape from fear; "Do your worst to me, that I may have no more fear of the worst." But that which was feared was not necessarily all ...
— The Rainbow • D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence
... aliquid majus potentiusque, omnibus aliis humanis voluptatibus, as [4722]one holds, there's something in a woman beyond all human delight; a magnetic virtue, a charming quality, an occult and powerful motive. The husband rules her as head, but she again commands his heart, he is her servant, she is only joy and content: no happiness is like unto it, no love so great as this of man and wife, no such comfort as [4723]placens uxor, a sweet wife: [4724]Omnis amor magnus, ...
— The Anatomy of Melancholy • Democritus Junior
... their own experience, in which the plot is transacted in the real lives of the actors, and not merely in their stage parts. The moving picture often emphasizes with great skill this double drama of interior motive and external behavior. Two men are quarreling, ostensibly about some money, but their passion is inexplicable. Then the picture fades out and what one or the other of the two men sees with his mind's eye is renacted. Across ...
— Public Opinion • Walter Lippmann
... Stanley in his introduction, "are the choicest and most curious of those that were related to me during seventeen years, and which have not been hitherto published in any of my books of travel." There are in all nineteen stories, new and striking in motive ...
— Round-about Rambles in Lands of Fact and Fancy • Frank Richard Stockton
... he answered, quickly; "there's no motive under Heaven to be imagined if the whole ...
— The Strand Magazine, Volume V, Issue 26, February 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly • Various
... crime.[50] Anarchists maintain that the criminal is manufactured by bad social conditions and would disappear in such a world as they aim at creating.[51] No doubt there is a great measure of truth in this view. There would be little motive to robbery, for example, in an Anarchist world, unless it were organized on a large scale by a body of men bent on upsetting the Anarchist regime. It may also be conceded that impulses toward criminal violence could be ...
— Proposed Roads To Freedom • Bertrand Russell
... for the first time the idea of inaccessible and mysterious buildings; and from the resort to this element or curiosity in describing both the prince and the princess, it appears as if it were then a new motive in story-telling, and had not lost its power. To modern ears it is, of course, done to death since the "Castle of Otranto"; though as a minor element it can still be gently used by the poet and novelist in a moated grange, a house in a marsh or a maze. Another ...
— Egyptian Tales, Second Series - Translated from the Papyri • W. M. Flinders Petrie
... from Gospel purity is every human motive when it comes to be tried by the Word! I will not conceal from you the state of my heart, nor deny that in accomplishing this thing it was influenced by a certain selfish feeling on my part; in one sense a disinterested selfishness I admit, but in another a selfishness that involves ...
— The Evil Eye; Or, The Black Spector - The Works of William Carleton, Volume One • William Carleton
... for paraffin, of ninepence for bacon, would have made him flush and grind his teeth for hours afterwards; but he noticed the effect upon himself of the new habit of niggardliness—how it disposed him to acerbity of temper. No matter how pure the motive, a man cannot devote his days to squeezing out pecuniary profits without some moral detriment. Formerly this woman, Mrs. Wick, with her gimlet eyes, and her leech lips, with her spyings and eavesdroppings, ...
— Will Warburton • George Gissing
... dark and desperate flash of a passion that would have been worse to face even than his comrade's wrath; it died, however, well-nigh instantly, repressed by a marvelous strength of control, whatever its motive. He was simply, as he had been throughout, passive—so passive that even Ezra Baroni, who knew what the Seraph never dreamed, looked at him in wonder, and felt a faint, sickly fear of that singular, unbroken calm. It perplexed ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]
... true, extreme cases of the economic motive for immigration. But they are quite in line with eighteenth century Mercantilist economic philosophy. Josiah Tucker, for example, in his Essay on Trade, 1753, urges the encouragement of immigration from France, and cites the value of Huguenot refugees. ...
— The Unpopular Review, Volume II Number 3 • Various
... on the other side. Ah, what sight would compare with that, if it broke suddenly upon our vision, if we could view life as we view the spreading country beneath us, when we stand on the summit of a tower! All our senses, being equally affected, would impart to our will a motive force which is, on the contrary, dissipated by the tardiness ...
— The Choice of Life • Georgette Leblanc
... she told Miss Lucinda. "You are exercising self-control and forbearance in dealing with that crude, undisciplined girl. Florence is the natural outcome of common stock and newly acquired riches. It is your noble aspiration to take this vulgar clay and mold it into something higher. Your motive is laudable, Lucinda; your self-sacrifice in giving up our evening hour together is heroic. I read you like an ...
— Miss Mink's Soldier and Other Stories • Alice Hegan Rice
... who swung an axe all day for his livelihood could have felled the ordinary fine gentleman with one blow of his fist. And they could shoot too, with their rusty matchlocks or clumsy snaphances. In some few the motive was fear, for they had seen or heard of the tender mercies of the savages. But in most, I think, it was a love of bold adventure, and especially the craving to push the white man's province beyond the narrow borders of the Tidewater. If you say that this was something ...
— Salute to Adventurers • John Buchan
... plodding neighbors would seem almost miraculous. He understood that the forces with which he was dealing were wellnigh infinite; and it was his delight to study them, to combine them, and make them his servants. It was his theory that the energy in nature was like a vast motive power, over which man could throw the belt of his skill and knowledge, and so produce results commensurate with the force of which he availed himself. There was, therefore, an unfailing zest in his work, ...
— Nature's Serial Story • E. P. Roe
... place, but the prejudices and temper of its members made in the same direction. Robespierre, trying to reconcile the narrow logic of a lawyer with the need of pleasing his ardent supporters, based his position on a charitable and not on a political motive: "Public assistance is a sacred debt of Society. Society is under the obligation of securing a living for all its members, either by procuring work for them, or by securing the necessaries of existence to those who ...
— The French Revolution - A Short History • R. M. Johnston
... remembered it, the service had a motive somewhat similar to his own, and he was glad to "bow his pride," because he believed that he would have ample chance to raise it up again. As he went about his work singing and whistling softly to himself, he cast many a glance up at ...
— The Hosts of the Air • Joseph A. Altsheler
... not expect to do so," he informed her promptly. "I assure you this move on my part was not actuated by any mercenary motive, Mrs. Rose." ...
— The Making of a Soul • Kathlyn Rhodes
... Donnelly's destruction. Step by step the plot was bared in all its hideous detail. The blood money was traced from the six hirelings up through the four superiors to Caesar himself. Then followed the effort to show a motive for the crime—not a difficult task, since every one knew of Donnelly's work against the Mafia. Maruffi's domination of the Society was harder to bring out; but when the State finally rested its case, even Blake, who had been dubious from the start, ...
— The Net • Rex Beach
... a Roman. Rome was his model, her ideals were his ideals. Therefore he built amphitheatres in which men were butchered, to the exquisite delight of vast audiences. Therefore, also, without the excuse of any conscientious motive, however insufficient or unsatisfactory, he persecuted the weak because they were weak and their sufferings would give pleasure to the strong or to those who chanced to be the majority ...
— Pearl-Maiden • H. Rider Haggard
... kind was altogether out of the question. Stolliver was a boorish, uncompanionable fellow, but a more unlikely man to commit such a serious crime could not have been found in the whole country side. Again, he could not have had any conceivable motive for making away with Savareen, as he had been working all day in the fields and knew nothing about the four hundred pounds. Besides, a little quiet investigation proved the thing to be an absolute impossibility. At the time of Savareen's disappearance, Stolliver had been sitting ...
— The Gerrard Street Mystery and Other Weird Tales • John Charles Dent
... motive for the ghost's appearance yet. We don't know how he appears, either. But unless I'm way off, the Frostola man has something to do ...
— The Blue Ghost Mystery • Harold Leland Goodwin
... England very little. Just as little does the size of the British fleet bear any concern to Germany. The German fleet is built against the German people. The growth of the British army and navy has in part the same motive. Armies and navies hold back the waves of populism and democracy. They seem a bulwark against Socialism. But in the great manufacturing and commercial nations, they will not be used for war, because they cannot be. The sacrifice appalls: the wreck ...
— The Unpopular Review, Volume II Number 3 • Various
... to hear him confess it, Bembo's intention to destroy us was beyond all question. His only motive could have been a desire to revenge the contumely heaped upon him the night previous, operating upon a heart irreclaimably savage, and at no time fraternally disposed toward ...
— Omoo: Adventures in the South Seas • Herman Melville
... silent. She began to wonder whether he had any private motive to gain, any place he sought to fill, that he should assume such a touch-me-not air at this stray allusion ...
— Temporal Power • Marie Corelli
... earlier famines missionaries were not always sufficiently alive to the risk of people professing a desire for Christianity, when their real motive was the hope of getting special consideration when famine relief was distributed. In some districts serious lapses took place after the distress was over. It is now the almost universal rule in missions, in ...
— India and the Indians • Edward F. Elwin
... master of the position at last; but he spoke as if he did not value that. His knowledge had furnished him with grounds for calling upon her, and he hastened to undeceive her from supposing that he could think ill of any motive of hers which gave him those ...
— The Hand of Ethelberta • Thomas Hardy
... declare, that to recommend goodness and innocence hath been my sincere endeavor in this history. * * * Besides displaying that beauty of virtue which may attract the admiration of mankind, I have attempted to engage a stronger motive to human action in her favor, by convincing men that their true interest directs them to a pursuit of her. For this purpose I have shown, that no acquisitions of guilt can compensate the loss of that solid ...
— A History of English Prose Fiction • Bayard Tuckerman
... years humanely supported in Dr. Johnson's house in London, told me, that upon his discovering that Dr. Swinfen had communicated his case, he was so much offended, that he was never afterwards fully reconciled to him. He indeed had good reason to be offended; for though Dr. Swinfen's motive was good, he inconsiderately betrayed a matter deeply interesting and of great delicacy, which had been entrusted to him in confidence; and exposed a complaint of his young friend and patient, which, in ...
— Life of Johnson - Abridged and Edited, with an Introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood • James Boswell
... their disapprobation of the new regulation. The colonel was a universal favorite, and they had full confidence in his judgment and his justice. Perhaps the desire to have a little fun and excitement was the strongest motive ...
— In School and Out - or, The Conquest of Richard Grant. • Oliver Optic
... Pythagoras applied philosophy to the use of government; the unwritten laws of Charondas accepted the aid of poetry and music, [16] and Zaleucus framed the republic of the Locrians, which stood without alteration above two hundred years. [17] From a similar motive of national pride, both Livy and Dionysius are willing to believe, that the deputies of Rome visited Athens under the wise and splendid administration of Pericles; and the laws of Solon were transfused into the twelve tables. If such an embassy had indeed been ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 4 • Edward Gibbon
... working for salvation are like men on a treadmill, going round, and round, and round; toiling, and toiling, and toiling; but nothing comes of it all. There is no progress, and there cannot be until you have the motive power within, till the breath of life comes from God, which can alone give you ...
— Sovereign Grace - Its Source, Its Nature and Its Effects • Dwight Moody
... something with his mouth. Possibly he smiled. Possibly he was malevolently disposed. At all events, whatever his motive or his humor, he did something with his mouth, and straightway his two rows of teeth gleamed forth, his eyes changed their position and also their hue, and the hollows in his ...
— Tin-Types Taken in the Streets of New York • Lemuel Ely Quigg
... the Greek no trace of the Teutonic idea of loyalty to a lord, which is the ruling motive of ...
— Andreas: The Legend of St. Andrew • Unknown
... me, that Mr. Sherman is thoroughly honest in this affair? That his only motive is a sense of ...
— Counsel for the Defense • Leroy Scott
... waiting to decide as to the succession until it was known whether Tungche's posthumous child would prove to be a son or a daughter, the empresses dowager hastened to make another selection and to place the young widow of the deceased sovereign in a state of honorable confinement. Their motive was plain. Had Ahluta's child happened to be a son, he would have been the legal emperor, as well as the heir by direct descent, and she herself could not have been excluded from a prominent share in the government. To the empresses dowager one child on the throne mattered no more than ...
— China • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... neither a bold nor a safe leader. He enticed others into scrapes, and kept out of them himself. Provided he could say a clever or a spiteful thing, he did not care whether it served or injured the cause. Spleen or the exercise of intellectual power was the motive of his patriotism, rather than principle. He would talk treason with a saving clause; and instil sedition into the public mind, through the medium of a third (who was to be the responsible) party. He made Sir Francis Burdett his spokesman in the House and to the country, often venting his chagrin ...
— The Spirit of the Age - Contemporary Portraits • William Hazlitt
... understand themselves nor are wholly comprehensible to others. In 'Monsieur de Camors', crowned by the Academy, he has yielded to the demands of a stricter realism. Especially after the fall of the Empire had removed a powerful motive for gilding the vices of aristocratic society, he painted its hard and selfish qualities as none of his contemporaries could have done. Octave Feuillet was elected to the Academie Francaise in 1862 to succeed Scribe. He ...
— Serge Panine • Georges Ohnet
... fortunes, these merchants yearned to be the founders of great estates; to live as virtual princes in the midst of wide possessions, even if these were still comparative solitudes. This aspiration was mixed with the mercenary motive of themselves owning the land from whence came the furs, pelts, timber and the ...
— History of the Great American Fortunes, Vol. I - Conditions in Settlement and Colonial Times • Myers Gustavus
... This was the motive that kept him at Interlaken, in the same hotel as the Wassiliefs. At his age, with his air of a good papa, he certainly could not dream of making that poor child love him, but he saw her so sweet, so brave, so generous to all the unfortunates of her party, ...
— Tartarin On The Alps • Alphonse Daudet
... Faliero, Werner, the Two Foscari, was the only sign of his approach to the really positive spirit. Dramatic art, in its purest modern conception, is genuinely positive; that is, it is the presentation of action, character, and motive in a self-sufficing and self-evolving order. There are no final causes, and the first moving elements are taken for granted to begin with. The dramatist creates, but it is the climax of his work to appear to stand absolutely apart and unseen, while the play unfolds itself to the spectator, ...
— Critical Miscellanies, Vol. I - Essay 3: Byron • John Morley
... yet I had sense enough to know that it was not for my own sweet sake that the Emperor had done it, but in order to encourage others to follow me. My conscience approved what I had done, for no sordid motive and nothing but the love of my country had prompted me; but now, as I walked round behind Napoleon, I felt humiliated and ashamed, like a prisoner led behind the ...
— Uncle Bernac - A Memory of the Empire • Arthur Conan Doyle
... could be abused, in the party conflicts of the day; that such abuse would manifest itself in a change of the law which would authorize an excessive issue of paper for the purpose of inflating prices and winning popular favor. To that it may be answered that the ascription of such a motive to Congress is altogether gratuitous and inadmissible. The theory of our institutions would lead us to a different conclusion. But a perfect security against a proceeding so reckless would be found to exist in the very nature of things. The political party which should be so blind to the true interests ...
— Complete State of the Union Addresses from 1790 to the Present • Various
... there can be no reasonable doubt of the ability of the farmers to institute and perfect such measures of self-education as are at present needed. But the spirit in which they enter upon this work must be broad, comprehensive, catholic. They will find something, I hope, of example, something of motive, something of power, in their experience as friends and supporters of our system of common school education; and something of all these, I trust, in the facts that this system is kept in motion by the self-imposed taxation of the whole people; that ...
— Thoughts on Educational Topics and Institutions • George S. Boutwell
... now, dear Edward, completed the brief narrative of some of the facts attending the latter years of your father's life. The motive which has induced me to commit them to writing has been a double one. I am anxious to give effect as far as may be to the desire expressed most strongly to Mr. Gaskell by your father, that you should ...
— The Lost Stradivarius • John Meade Falkner
... dandy's curious game played afterward, in Paris, but not for amusement; not with a motive of any sort, indeed, but simply from a selfish indifference to other people's comfort and rights. One does not see it as frequently in Paris as he might expect to, for there the law says, in effect, "It is the business of ...
— Innocents abroad • Mark Twain
... joy is the sight of death or dead bodies. Those who are her disciples must offer up human victims killed without the shedding of blood, and the more he can kill the more of a saint he becomes. The motive for this is never gain, for they rarely plunder, but purely religious zeal. The reward is an immortality of bliss hereafter, which Bowhani will secure them; a life like that of the Mohammedan Paradise, where there are material joys to be possessed forever without ...
— Cord and Creese • James de Mille
... a pencil and in a few minutes outlined a machine, which he said would cut a trench two feet deep, lay the pipe at its bottom, and cover the earth in behind it. The motive power need be only a team of oxen or mules. These creatures had but to trudge slowly onward. The machine would do its work ...
— Historic Tales, Vol. 1 (of 15) - The Romance of Reality • Charles Morris
... days, were formed those vast and prodigious layers of coal, which an ever—increasing consumption must utterly use up in about three centuries more, if people do not find some more economic light than gas, and some cheaper motive ...
— A Journey to the Centre of the Earth • Jules Verne
... mirror. "I'm sunburnt enough to look like a Sikh." And a feeling of bitter resentment was growing against him now, stronger than I had felt before, knowing as I did that in spite of his kindness, and the friendly feeling he professed, he was moved by the strong motive of making ...
— Gil the Gunner - The Youngest Officer in the East • George Manville Fenn
... dear," Jane soothed. "I realize you know something of the queer happenings at Lenox, and I can see you have some strong motive for withholding the explanation. There is a reason, of course, and I have faith in your sincerity. After all, Wellington is quite a little city in itself, and we are bound to meet queer problems here. I am on my way to the office now to get one off ...
— Jane Allen: Junior • Edith Bancroft
... of William Penn had been sacredly preserved by the descendants of the first settlers, with whom the remembrance of the causes which had led their ancestors to forsake their native country, was cherished like the traditions of religion, and became a motive to themselves, for indulging in the exercise of those blameless principles, which had been so obnoxious to the arrogant spirit of the Old World. The associates of the Wests and the Pearsons, considered the patriarchs of Pennsylvania ...
— The Life, Studies, And Works Of Benjamin West, Esq. • John Galt
... such a very little. Not yet iss it arranged the motive-power to give-forth. One more change-to-be-made that shall require. But the other phenomena are all in this little half-grain comprised. Later I shall tell you more. Take it. It iss without price.' He laid his hand on my shoulder. ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... Breaks forth into the precious-streaming tears Of self-accusing, in our court the wheel Of justice doth run counter to the edge. Howe'er that thou may'st profit by thy shame For errors past, and that henceforth more strength May arm thee, when thou hear'st the Siren-voice, Lay thou aside the motive to this grief, And lend attentive ear, while I unfold How opposite a way my buried flesh Should have impell'd thee. Never didst thou spy In art or nature aught so passing sweet, As were the limbs, that in their beauteous frame Enclos'd me, and are scatter'd now in dust. If ...
— The Divine Comedy, Complete - The Vision of Paradise, Purgatory and Hell • Dante Alighieri
... subject. For the present I will only say that there were better reasons than the obvious one that such sham science as this opened a scientific career to very stupid men, and all the other careers to shameless rascals, provided they were industrious enough. It is true that this motive operated very powerfully; but when the new departure in scientific doctrine which is associated with the name of the great naturalist Charles Darwin began, it was not only a reaction against a barbarous pseudo-evangelical teleology intolerably obstructive to all ...
— Heartbreak House • George Bernard Shaw
... young women, nearly every one of whose jaws and pretty mouths was engaged in this pleasing occupation; and so much power was generated that it would, if applied, have kept the car in motion if the steam had been shut off—at least it would have furnished the motive for illuminating the car ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... of bad-tasting or bad-smelling food), are originally parts of the food-getting behavior, having the general character of reactions preparatory to eating. However this may be, we can easily see the great importance of the hunger motive in human life; we have only to consider the matter in the same way as ...
— Psychology - A Study Of Mental Life • Robert S. Woodworth
... the circulation of the blood laid the foundation of the Iatrophysical school by showing that this vital process was comparable to a hydraulic system. In his On the Motive of Animals, Borelli first attempted to account for the phenomena of life and diseases on these principles. The iatromechanics held that the great cause of disease is due to different states of elasticity of the solids of the body interfering with the movements of the fluids, which are themselves ...
— A History of Science, Volume 2(of 5) • Henry Smith Williams
... Laupepa and Mataafa; secondly, the supersession of the unlucky Chief Justice and President by men better qualified for their tasks. To effect the former purpose, he made his only practical intromission in local politics, and made it unsuccessfully. The motive of his letters to the Times was the hope to effect the second. In this matter, after undergoing the risk, which was at one moment serious, of deportation, he in the end saw his wishes fulfilled. The first Chief ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 25 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... to it, I am afraid, is impracticable; to suppose they will voluntarily do it, I am sure is unlikely. The Colony of Georgia will be a proper asylum for these. This will make the act of parliament of more effect. Here they will have the best motive for industry; a possession of their own, and no possibility of ...
— Biographical Memorials of James Oglethorpe • Thaddeus Mason Harris
... was a young giant. For certain the old father of Frederick the Great would have had him in his regiment of Grenadier Guards. Well, for that matter, he was a grenadier in the employ of the same family now. He hobbled in under his own motive power and leaned against the wall until the first flurry was over. Then, at a nod from one of the shirt-sleeved surgeons, he stretched himself upon a bare wooden table which had just been vacated and indicated that he wanted relief for his leg—which leg, I recall, was ...
— Paths of Glory - Impressions of War Written At and Near the Front • Irvin S. Cobb
... The whole of the steep rocky gorge of that tiny torrent the Canneto is full of mills, each emitting a whirring sound which mingles with the continual plash of the water as it descends in miniature cascades the full length of the ravine, providing in its headlong course towards the sea the motive power required to turn all this quantity of machinery. Bridges span the Canneto at several points, whilst either bank is occupied by tiny factories of paper or soap, and by winding stone stair-ways that lead upward to terraces contrived ...
— The Naples Riviera • Herbert M. Vaughan
... "The motive," cried Tom, "that may be easily explained; and I doubt not but you will find, although it may at present appear a little mysterious, Sparkle will be fully able to shew cause and produce effect. He is however a man of honour ...
— Real Life In London, Volumes I. and II. • Pierce Egan
... me; but Desgenais had undertaken the task of curing me of my love and was prepared to treat my disease heroically. A long friendship founded on mutual services gave him rights, and as his motive appeared praiseworthy I allowed ...
— The Confession of a Child of The Century • Alfred de Musset
... and perhaps a less creditable disposition to hedge, have something to do with this dating forward of one's main events, but in the particular case of The World Set Free there was, I think, another motive in holding the Great War back, and that was to allow the chemist to get well forward with his discovery of the release of atomic energy. 1956—or for that matter 2056—may be none too late for that crowning revolution in human potentialities. And apart from ...
— The World Set Free • Herbert George Wells
... when viewed from his favourite point against the garden railings, and with some touch of distance, it caused a pleasurable rising of the artist's heart. "I have thrown away," he ejaculated, "an invaluable motive; and this shall be the subject ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 5 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... cease by day or night, until, as in the case of his kindred ophidian, his two extremities are brought together. For Mr. Drinkwater has contracted with the British Electric Lighting Company to supply him with the electric light. The motive power is all ready, and no sooner is the apparatus fixed than county Clare will be astonished by the sight of work going on perpetually till it is completed, and amazement will reach its highest pitch. The people, gentle and simple, already confess themselves astonished at ...
— Disturbed Ireland - Being the Letters Written During the Winter of 1880-81. • Bernard H. Becker
... loth to lose the object who has shed her brightest hues on you, and who in giving birth to your sweet offspring may chance to fade almost to nothingness herself. But this should serve to bind your affections still stronger to her. Forgive me for talking thus to you, my dear Clare. I have no other motive than your domestic happiness, which I anxiously pray may be undisturbed by any event. I lament to learn by your letter that to stifle recollections of the past, &c., you should have fled to such resources on your journey home. Now you become the sufferer ...
— Life and Remains of John Clare - "The Northamptonshire Peasant Poet" • J. L. Cherry
... black bonnet jingling together. "Yes, I've been so nasty about Marcia Oldham that I want to make some public reparation." She drew herself up and spoke virtuously; but Hayden doubted the entire sincerity of the statement. That might be her reason, in part, but he felt convinced of some deeper motive. She might feel that she no longer had cause for active opposition to Marcia; but the girl did not appeal to her temperament and never could. At best, she could regard a woman of Marcia Oldham's type with but tepid interest. "And she's been gracious enough to say she'd come. At first, she refused ...
— The Silver Butterfly • Mrs. Wilson Woodrow
... guide is out of sight, his cup-shaped ears detect the faintest call of the sea. Then he works in a direct course to the beach, where everything is writ large and plain to his understanding. Of his own motive he never ventures inland without a compass, and with that in his hand he is safe, even in a strange place and out of sound ...
— My Tropic Isle • E J Banfield
... that when the report of Stradella's assassination reached the ears of Purcell, and he was informed jealousy was the motive to it, he lamented his fate exceedingly; and, in regard of his great merit as a musician, said he could have forgiven him any injury in that kind; which, adds the relater, 'those who remember how lovingly Mr. Purcell lived with his wife, ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 1 • Rupert Hughes
... carried screwed on his helmet, as well as another exactly like it. When he was sitting with us in the hall, he behaved in a very strange manner—sometimes he was merry, sometimes cross; by turns courteous and rude in his demeanour, without any one being able to see a motive for such constant changes. I longed to know where he came from; but how could I ask my guest such a question? He told us as much as this, that he was starved with cold in our country, and that his own was much warmer. Also he appeared well acquainted with the city of Constantinople, ...
— Sintram and His Companions • Friedrich de la Motte Fouque
... Austen, have completely dominated our age, and have displaced the epic and legendary themes of Scott, Byron, Campbell, and Southey. The Two Voices, In Memoriam, The Ring and the Book, Silas Marner, Vanity Fair, Bleak House, dissect brain and heart, but do not make their prime motive in any thrilling history. The crisis of modern romance goes on in the conscience, not in the outside world. Hence the enormous multiplication of the psychologic novel, a form of art which the eighteenth ...
— Studies in Early Victorian Literature • Frederic Harrison
... Murray?" cried the lieutenant. "No, sir. What! Do you want to leave me in the lurch?" Then, knowing from old experience the jealous motive which animated the lad who was left out of the commission, the officer clapped the midshipman on one shoulder warmly. "No, no, Roberts; I can't spare you. I want your help, my lad; and besides, you will be safer ...
— Hunting the Skipper - The Cruise of the "Seafowl" Sloop • George Manville Fenn
... no means assume, even for one evening, such a costume. I brought in my dresses, showed their length and their propriety, but in vain; and, in fact, as to their being in the right, there could be no doubt, and nothing but a kind motive could have induced them to take this trouble; so I yielded with a good grace, and thanked the cabinet council for their timely warning, though fearing, that in this land of procrastination, it would be difficult to procure another ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca
... few months; think of all the time. Think of other things than just—that sort of—love. Children, you know, and—and books, don't you know? Things that count. Be—I don't say be guided entirely by what your father and lots of other persons think, but be influenced by it! Realize that we have no motive but—but affection, in advising ...
— The Heart of Rachael • Kathleen Norris
... be his motive? Was he a charity-mad personage, such as we sometimes see among bigger folk, determined to benefit his kind, whether they would or no? Had he, perchance, been bereaved of his own younglings, and felt moved ...
— Little Brothers of the Air • Olive Thorne Miller
... me," said the Reverend Mr. Prentice doubtfully. "Who would have any motive for doing such ...
— Average Jones • Samuel Hopkins Adams
... in opinion with Sir Harry as to the not advancing after the battle of Vimeiro, his opinion was, that Sir H. Burrard "had decided upon fair military grounds, in the manner which appeared to him to be the most conducive to the interests of the country;" and his belief, "that Sir Harry had no motive for his decision which could be supposed personal to him, or which as an officer he could ...
— Maxims And Opinions Of Field-Marshal His Grace The Duke Of Wellington, Selected From His Writings And Speeches During A Public Life Of More Than Half A Century • Arthur Wellesley, Duke of Wellington
... promoters of it were not suffered to succeed. The Preface to our American Book of Common Prayer refers to this attempted review of 1689 "as a great and good work." But the greatness and the goodness must have lain in the motive, for one fails to discern them either in the matter or in the manner of what ...
— A Short History of the Book of Common Prayer • William Reed Huntington
... arrival at Paris, the Princesse de Lamballe told me her motive for sending the express, who, she said, informed her, on his return, that I had a letter for the Queen. I said it was more than I knew. "Oh, I suppose that is because the letter bears no address," replied she; "but you were shown the ...
— Marguerite de Navarre - Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Queen of Navarre • Marguerite de Navarre
... these men who were carrying him away captive, and what was their motive? He imagined that they must surely be those fierce pursuers who had striven to capture him upon the river, and who had followed him into the garden where he had hoped to hide himself from their malice. Doubtless they had found him as he lay in a momentary ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... pardon, sir!... If they had recaptured her from the robbers, it would have been for no other motive than for ransom. The robbers, before that happened could neither write a letter nor imitate the signature of the lord of Spychow, nor send an ...
— The Knights of the Cross • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... and there were two or three who laughed outright." Only none "dropped a veil over her charms" and thus none incurred the suspicion, as on that field of Ashby, that she was "a beauty of ten years' standing" whose motive, gallant Sir Walter supposes in defence, however, was doubtless "a surfeit of such vanities and a willingness to give a fair chance to the rising beauties of the age." But the most conscious of the fair was Mollie below, ...
— A Knight of the Cumberland • John Fox Jr.
... drill, but they did not come again yesterday. I don't believe there is sufficient zeal among them to enable them to go through the tedious routine of drill with any regularity, unless held together by some stronger motive than now exists. I find them rather stupid. About half didn't know which their right foot was, and kept facing to the left when I told them to face to the right. They seemed to ...
— Letters from Port Royal - Written at the Time of the Civil War (1862-1868) • Various
... his quick eyes upon her and dwelt over her for a space, seeking out, as it were, the motive beneath ...
— The Faith of Men • Jack London
... live," interrupted Lady Constance. She was not sorry to have a companion of her own sex, and Janet would make herself generally useful, if the ride was long and her ladyship should fall ill, as she was certain to do. She knew also Janet's motive for following her. She was interested ...
— Mistress Penwick • Dutton Payne
... never went to church. She had relinquished church when she had given up all other social joys that called for motive power beyond the limits of ...
— Susan Clegg and a Man in the House • Anne Warner
... depart. Probably they had expected to profit by my intoxication; but finding that my new friend was benevolently bent on preventing me from getting dead drunk, had now abandoned all hope of thriving pleasantly on my winnings. Whatever their motive might be, at any rate they went away in a body. When the old soldier returned, and sat down again opposite to me at the table, we had the room to ourselves. I could see the croupier, in a sort of vestibule which opened out of it, eating ...
— Stories By English Authors: France • Various
... with a golden rod in His hand, which had as many hooks as there had been prayers for their souls; by these He appeared to draw them into a place of repose. She understood by this, that whenever any one prays generally, from a motive of charity, for the souls in Purgatory, the greater part of those who, during their lives, have exercised themselves in ...
— Purgatory • Mary Anne Madden Sadlier |
