"Motive" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... in the past had served the State with credit in the great public offices that satisfy men's reputable pride and honourable ambition, but none before him had served his fellow creatures during a long life with no other motive than to bind up their wounds and aggravate the mercies ...
— Great Testimony - against scientific cruelty • Stephen Coleridge
... when any noble family became extinct? What qualifications were necessary in those who are to be created new lords: whether the humour of the prince, a sum of money to a court lady, or a design of strengthening a party opposite to the public interest, ever happened to be the motive in those advancements? What share of knowledge these lords had in the laws of their country, and how they came by it, so as to enable them to decide the properties of their fellow-subjects in the last resort? Whether they were always so free from avarice, partialities, ...
— Gulliver's Travels - into several remote nations of the world • Jonathan Swift
... from anything of the kind. I took steps to insure that any evil which might come should fall on me only, and that"—here he turned and looked at the prisoner—"was the cause of conduct upon my part which has been too harshly judged. My only motive was to screen those who were dear to me from any possible connection with scandal or disgrace. That scandal and disgrace would come with my brother was only to say that what had ...
— Tales of Terror and Mystery • Arthur Conan Doyle
... papers were full of the attempted burglary. Before the magistrates, the man who had been apprehended said not a word. He seemed to accept his position with stolid fatalism. The cross-examination as to his associates, and the motive of the attempted robbery, ...
— The Governors • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... touching—so touching indeed that Hugh sometimes debated within himself whether he might not so far sacrifice his own bent, which was more and more directed to the maintenance of an independent attitude, in order to give his father so deep and lasting a delight. But he was forced to decide that the motive was not cogent enough, and that to adopt a definite position, involving the suppression of some of his strongest convictions, for the sake of giving one he loved a pleasure, was like exposing the ark to the risks of battle. He knew well enough that if he had declared his full mind on ...
— Beside Still Waters • Arthur Christopher Benson
... According to the message, the papers hammered the stuffing out of the Crestline road. But you've got to admit that they haven't got either the motive power or the money. The other road saw a great chance to step in and make itself solid with this country over here. It's lending the men and the rolling stock. They're going to open another fellow's road, for the publicity and the ...
— The White Desert • Courtney Ryley Cooper
... continue such liberal forms. During the first Republic, Marathon and Thermopylae saved the principle of Western democracy against Oriental despotism, Salamis and Plataea saved Greek letters and Greek art to the continents that were yet to be. Christianity changed the motive but not the method in evolution; and, finally in the last great Republic, the American Revolution proclaimed liberty of thought, the war of 1812 secured American independence, while, beside the wandering Antietam and on the field of Gettysburg "green regiments went to their graves ...
— Woman and the Republic • Helen Kendrick Johnson
... But the petitioner could not help putting forward the certificates of that marriage, because two of them were written on the back of the certificate of the marriage of the Duke of Cumberland with Olive Wilmot. Men of intelligence could not fail to see the motive for writing the certificates of those two marriages on the same piece of paper. The first claim to the consideration of the royal family put forward by Mrs. Serres was, that she was the illegitimate daughter of the Duke of Cumberland by Mrs. Payne—a ...
— Celebrated Claimants from Perkin Warbeck to Arthur Orton • Anonymous
... quick turns to follow the water and the need for speed gave no consideration to the helpless rider. The image of six pairs of snaky black eyes came to help the benumbed brain, and I knew with whom I was again captive. But there was no question about the friendly motive now, for there was no friendly motive now. And as we pushed on east, Jondo and Bill Banney were hurrying toward the northwest, and the space between us widened every minute. A wave of helplessness and despair swept ...
— Vanguards of the Plains • Margaret McCarter
... darling! This detective isn't interested in you. What motive could he have in looking you up? Bingle is in the dark, so it's evident he hasn't hired any one to investigate your past. Forget it! That isn't what I want to talk to you about. I've been half-crazy, dear, for the past eight months. Why did you ...
— Mr. Bingle • George Barr McCutcheon
... own presidents, and celebrated in common their sacrifices, festivals, and banquets. We have, therefore, good reason for agreeing in the opinion of the celebrated historian, who considers that in the establishment of a corporation "the guild should be to a certain degree the motive power, and the Roman college, with its organization, the material which should be used to bring ...
— Manners, Custom and Dress During the Middle Ages and During the Renaissance Period • Paul Lacroix
... race prejudice is less strong in the North is another inducement to leave the South, for "Jim Crow" cars and political disfranchisement have irritated many. Finally the dread of lynch law may be mentioned as a motive for migration, though its actual importance may be doubted. Not all the negroes who have moved to the North have remained there. Many do not allow for the higher cost of food and shelter in their new home, and these demands upon the higher wages leave a smaller margin than was expected. ...
— The New South - A Chronicle Of Social And Industrial Evolution • Holland Thompson
... of the soul. Layer upon layer, cross-section upon cross-section have been piled before us. And what a melodramatic cinema of thrills and shivers, villains and heroes, heroines and adventuresses have they not unfolded. Each motive, as the stiff psychologist of the nineteenth century, with his plaster-of-Paris categories and pigeon holes and classifications, labelled the teeming creatures of the mind, becomes anon a strutting actor ...
— The Glands Regulating Personality • Louis Berman, M.D.
... village water-wheel, The motive bullock bows his crest, And signals forth a mute appeal ...
— Rhymes of the East and Re-collected Verses • John Kendall (AKA Dum-Dum)
... are many who will contend that I have some selfish or spiteful motive in writing thus strongly in condemnation of the waltz. Many will doubtless claim that the waltz is very moral and healthful, is indulged in by the best people of every land, seemingly tolerated by all, and that he who raises his voice ...
— From the Ball-Room to Hell • T. A. Faulkner
... Cavalla garrison, whose "treasonable" conduct became likewise the subject of judicial investigation—trial was sedulously deferred by a variety of ingenious contrivances; nothing being more remote from the Government's mind than an intention to draw the truth into the light. The motive of these proceedings doubtless was one of policy chiefly—to ruin the enemies of the regime in public esteem by branding them as traitors, even if no conviction could be obtained. But policy was not the only element. To judge by the harshness displayed, ...
— Greece and the Allies 1914-1922 • G. F. Abbott
... given her heart to Jesus; love to him was the ruling motive of her life, and to please and honor him she was ready to do or endure anything. "I will try, mamma," she said, "and you too will ask God to ...
— Elsie's children • Martha Finley
... would leave the neighbourhood of so excellent a father. They overwhelmed him with marks of affection, and vowed that the one had left Lepanto, and the other Berat, only in order to share his danger. Ali was by no means duped by these protestations, of which he divined the motive only too well, and though he had never loved his sons, he suffered cruelly in discovering that he was not beloved ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - ALI PACHA • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... to show that this young lady was not the purely impassive medium in this matter that my learned friend, Mr. Short, would lead the Court to believe. She was acting from motive." ...
— Mr. Meeson's Will • H. Rider Haggard
... not long in perceiving why he was selected for the office of governor; for we find him writing home, "I think I can see the true motive of the expedition, and believe it to be a sham to catch the attention of the English people." With him, however, it was no sham. He was determined to do what he was professedly sent to do, viz.: put down the slave-trade. "I will do it," he said, "for I value my life as naught, and should only ...
— Brave Men and Women - Their Struggles, Failures, And Triumphs • O.E. Fuller
... made him regard as a safe asylum against all reverses) the immense treasures he had pillaged and collected m Spain, under pretext of sending the sums necessary to sustain the war, and the conquests he intended to make; and this last project was, perhaps, the motive power of all the rest. The madness of these schemes, and his obstinacy in clinging to them, were not discovered until afterwards. The astonishment then was great indeed, upon discovering the poverty of the resources with which he thought ...
— The Memoirs of Louis XIV., His Court and The Regency, Complete • Duc de Saint-Simon
... grievances, or the proper remedies for them, than the aggregate amount of the actual, dear-bought experience, the honest feelings, and heart-felt wishes of a whole people, informed and directed by the greatest power of understanding in the community, unbiassed by any sinister motive."[21] Hazlitt was not a republican, and he disapproved of the Utopian rhapsodies of Shelley, woven as they seemed of mere moonshine, without applicability to the evils that demanded immediate reform. But he did insist that there was a power in the people to change its government and its governors, ...
— Hazlitt on English Literature - An Introduction to the Appreciation of Literature • Jacob Zeitlin
... the conduct of Catharine de' Medici herself to any such motive is the extreme of absurdity. Even the author of the "Tocsain contre les massacreurs" rejects the supposition without hesitation. (Original edition, p. 157.) Catharine was certainly a ...
— History of the Rise of the Huguenots - Volume 2 • Henry Baird
... settled at Selsey, King Ethelwalch and Queen Ebba ordered their people to be baptized. I fear I'm too old to believe that a whole nation can change its heart at the King's command, and I had a shrewd suspicion that their real motive was to get a good harvest. No rain had fallen for two or three years, but as soon as we had finished baptizing, it fell heavily, and they all ...
— Rewards and Fairies • Rudyard Kipling
... "I believe I've the motive here," I said and thrust the mutilated volume into her hand. "Some one stole these leaves out of Mr. Gilbert's diary. The books are filled with intimate details of the affairs of people—things which people prefer should not be known—names, details and dates written ...
— The Million-Dollar Suitcase • Alice MacGowan
... ignorance, and a sordid life hopeless of better fortune, and opening to him the whole realm of mighty possibilities in an American life—did not imply any love for the little individual whom he thus benefited. It had some other motive. ...
— Doctor Grimshawe's Secret - A Romance • Nathaniel Hawthorne
... adapted to the situation, and the capacity of the soil is such as to feed them fully, profit may be safely calculated upon. Animals are to be looked upon as machines for converting herbage into money. Now it costs a certain amount to keep up the motive power of any machine, and also to make good the wear and tear incident to its working; and in the case of animals it is only so much as is digested and assimilated, in addition to the amount thus ...
— The Principles of Breeding • S. L. Goodale
... dismembered; her extension to the Aegean Sea was seriously obstructed, if not practically blocked; and, bitterest and most tragic of all, the redemption of the Bulgarians in Macedonia, which was the principal object and motive of her war against Turkey in 1912, was frustrated and rendered hopeless by Greek and Servian annexations of Macedonian territory extending from the Mesta to the Drin with the great cities of Saloniki, Kavala, and Monastir, which in the patriotic national consciousness ...
— The Balkan Wars: 1912-1913 - Third Edition • Jacob Gould Schurman
... of course, possible that Helm was a natural-born criminal, yet his motive for trying his skill at counterfeiting was revenge ...
— A Young Man in a Hurry - and Other Short Stories • Robert W. Chambers
... infinitely powerful Being exists, and he was the creator of the universe; but to incline him towards the creation there could be no possible motive of happiness to himself, and he must, says King, have either sought his own happiness or that of the universe which he made. Therefore his own ideas must have been the communication of happiness to the creature. ...
— The Fallen Star; and, A Dissertation on the Origin of Evil • E. L. Bulwer; and, Lord Brougham
... discovered? Justice always looks for a motive; how, then could they bring it home to us? They could only find out that a young lady adored by De Breulh had thrown him over in order ...
— Caught In The Net • Emile Gaboriau
... appointed spot, a house near the railway, was escorted by a brigade with a military band, and accompanied by many officers in "full fig." With one officer, Colonel William Levy, since a member of Congress from Louisiana, I made my appearance on a hand-car, the motive power of which was two negroes. Descendants of the ancient race of Abraham, dealers in cast-off raiment, would have scorned to bargain for our rusty suits of Confederate gray. General Canby met me with much urbanity. We retired to a room, and in a few moments ...
— Destruction and Reconstruction: - Personal Experiences of the Late War • Richard Taylor
... and—for Cheyne could on occasion display a polished wit—light laughter filled the room, until Caroline Schuyler, perhaps not without a motive, suggested a stroll on the lawn. If there was dew upon the grass none of them heeded it, and it was but seldom anyone enjoyed the privilege of pacing that sod when Mr. Schuyler was at home. Every foot had cost him many dollars, and it remained but an imperfect imitation of an ...
— The Cattle-Baron's Daughter • Harold Bindloss
... rolling mill completes what the puddling hall does in the rough. Five hundred and fifty thousand tons of iron, all shaped, are taken from the forge every day. To reach such a result it requires no less than 3,000 workmen and a motive power of ...
— Scientific American Supplement, No. 488, May 9, 1885 • Various
... 'recreate' (v. sup. Vol. I. p. 471) does not cover a difference in kind.... One feels that Prof. S. is rather sympathetic to that which traditional French criticism regards as essential ... close psychological analysis of motive," etc. And so he even questions whether what I have given, much as he likes and praises it, is "A History of The French Novel." But did I ever undertake to give this from the French point of view, or ...
— A History of the French Novel, Vol. 2 - To the Close of the 19th Century • George Saintsbury
... a piece of paper—a significant document, for it explained the motive for the crime. Kid Wolf read it and understood. It ...
— Kid Wolf of Texas - A Western Story • Ward M. Stevens
... say in Greek, oida, I know, but is-men, we know? Why tetlka, but tetlamen? Why memona, but memamen? There is no recollection in the minds of the Greeks of the motive power that was once at work, and left its traces in these grammatical convulsions; but in Sanskrit we still see, as it were, alower stratum of grammatical growth, and we can there watch the regular working of laws which required these changes, and which have ...
— Chips from a German Workshop - Volume IV - Essays chiefly on the Science of Language • Max Muller
... Ulysses, our Gascon could not console himself for not having guessed why Aramis had asked Percerin to show him the king's new costumes. "There is not a doubt," he said to himself, "that my friend the bishop of Vannes had some motive in that;" and then he began to rack his brains most uselessly. D'Artagnan, so intimately acquainted with all the court intrigues, who knew the position of Fouquet better than even Fouquet himself did, had conceived the strangest fancies and suspicions at the announcement ...
— The Man in the Iron Mask • Alexandre Dumas, Pere
... certain scientific opinions. There is no authority to try them for heresy or to turn them out of your society unless they hold certain scientific ideas. They have no sense of compulsion except to find and accept that which they discover to be true. The one aim of science is the truth. There is no motive ...
— Our Unitarian Gospel • Minot Savage
... business at once," he suggested. "Sooner the better. In a murder, look for the motive. Miss Copley—Mr. Bolt—can either of you tell me who might have wanted ...
— The Monk of Hambleton • Armstrong Livingston
... stronger than medicine, more tenacious than any other motive that keeps the life-current brisk and vigorous, made Dick's recovery swift and sure. Rosa had no torments for him now. The blood-red rose had proved a magician's amulet to confirm her mind in the sweet teachings of her heart. But the ...
— The Iron Game - A Tale of the War • Henry Francis Keenan
... retreating footsteps and smiled softly. It was nothing new for Ellen to be sending her to the village to transact the business she no longer felt able to attend to herself, but the subterfuges to which she resorted to conceal her real motive were amusing. Lucy knew well that to-day, if it had not been the cream separator, something else equally important would have furnished the excuse for keeping her aunt at home. It seemed so foolish not to be honest about the matter. To pursue any other method, however, would have ...
— The Wall Between • Sara Ware Bassett
... I can be rich without money, by endeavoring to be superior to everything poor. I would have my services to my country unstained by any interested motive.—LORD COLLINGWOOD. ...
— Pushing to the Front • Orison Swett Marden
... which he had referred to his intention of taking a partner, supposing at the time that you were as firmly and finally settled as St Paul's Cathedral. "Whereas," says he, "Mr Clennam might now believe, if I entertained his proposition, that I had a sinister and designing motive in what was open free speech. Which I can't bear," says he, "which I really ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens
... than a man. He had hunted with the human pack and he had found selfishness and jealousy and treachery on every hand. He came to look upon these as the essential characteristics of the human race. Even now that he was wounded he saw but one sordid motive of greed under the hesitant offers of help; even now he had been less like a wounded man than a stricken wolf. The wolf would have withdrawn to his hidden lair; he would have contented himself with scant food; he would have licked his wound ...
— Wolf Breed • Jackson Gregory
... Don Carlos's motive for telling Tony Standish he was in love with her, and she realised that Tony had been cleverer than he knew. By telling her of Don Carlos's confession and assuring her that he had complete faith in her he had, as it were, placed her on her honour ...
— Bandit Love • Juanita Savage
... Salvador, its crest topped with the Hermitage, and the pines, the cypresses, and the prickly pears around that rough testimonial of popular piety. The sanctuary seemed to be talking to him like an indiscreet friend, betraying the real motive that had caused him to evade his appointment with his political friends and disobey his ...
— The Torrent - Entre Naranjos • Vicente Blasco Ibanez
... customary fires, or because fires had to be less frequently kindled upon them than on the more important stations; or, finally, because these hill-forts, from some disadvantage of situation, were no longer used as places of strength, and so the beacon-keepers had no motive to attempt consolidating them throughout by the piecemeal application of the vitrifying agent. But the old Highland mode of accounting for the present appearance of Knock Farril and its vitrified remains is perhaps, after all, quite as good in its way as any of ...
— The Cruise of the Betsey • Hugh Miller
... looked at Bachelder as though expecting commendation for his honorable intention, and, receiving none, went on, dilating on his plans for the child as if resolved to earn it. Yet, setting aside this patent motive, it was easy to see as he warmed to his subject that Andrea had not erred in counting on Lola to bring him back. With her beauty she would do any man proud! The whole United States would not be able to produce ...
— The Spinner's Book of Fiction • Various
... excesses had disgusted and deterred him. He shook himself easily free of a habit which had never gained a hold upon him, and had ever since found his abstinence a source both of vanity and of distinction. Nothing annoyed him more than to hear it put down to any ethical motive. "If I liked the beastly stuff, I should swim in it to-morrow," he would say with an angry eye when certain acquaintance—not those he made at Labour Congresses—goaded him on the point. "As it is, why should I make it, or chloral, or morphia, or any other poison, my master! What's ...
— Marcella • Mrs. Humphry Ward
... piece of bread given to beggars; the Eng. "bribe" has passed through the meanings of alms, blackmail and extortion, to gifts received or given in order to influence corruptly). The public offence of bribery may be defined as the offering or giving of payment in some shape or form that it may be a motive in the performance of functions for which the proper motive ought to be a conscientious sense of duty. When this is superseded by the sordid impulses created by the bribe, a person is said to be corrupted, and thus corruption is a term sometimes held equivalent ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 4, Part 3 - "Brescia" to "Bulgaria" • Various
... or to gain your silence, by practising upon your feelings. Be silent. I am not the less ruined, not the less disgraced, not the less utterly undone. Be silent; my honour, all the same, in four-and-twenty hours, has gone for ever. I have no motive, then, to deceive you. You must believe what I speak; even what I speak, the most degraded of men. I say again, never, never, never, never, never was my honour before sullied, though guilty of a ...
— Vivian Grey • The Earl of Beaconsfield
... been left at our house, and carried them to her own room, where they have laid since. I thought at the time, it was to spare me the pain of coming across them, as she had heard something of our dispute; but now, I recognize the possibility of there having been a more pitiful motive. She never utters his name either. I wonder have I done them both the awful wrong of thrusting myself between their young hearts, and spoiling the happy ambition of their lives—may God help me to repair it if ...
— Honor Edgeworth • Vera
... of objectivity—odious word—aiming, on the contrary, at giving us an exact presentment of all that happens in life, carefully avoid all complicated explanations, all disquisitions on motive, and confine themselves to let persons and events pass before our eyes. In their opinion, psychology should be concealed in the book, as it is in reality, under the ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume VIII. • Guy de Maupassant
... or received, while alone in the forest, his inspirations, which have told him what to do. He takes the objects suggested, and with them performs his wonder works. Sometimes he tells others to do the same with the same things, but in this case he is still the motive force; it is his enchantment. In illustration of this I give ...
— The Algonquin Legends of New England • Charles Godfrey Leland
... views of them; and there is no commoner error in private effort or in legislation than to aim at some obvious good, whilst overlooking other consequences of our action, the evil of which may far outweigh that good. An important consequence of eating is to satisfy hunger, and this is the ordinary motive to eat; but it is a poor account of the physiological consequences. An important consequence of firing a gun is the propulsion of the bullet or shell; but there are many other consequences in the whole effect, and one of them is the heating of the barrel, ...
— Logic - Deductive and Inductive • Carveth Read
... her, almost stupidly. His mind was groping about, trying to find some adequate motive for this new line of duplicity. He kept warning himself that she was not to be trusted. Human beings, all human beings, he had found, moved only by indirection. He was too old a bird to have ...
— Never-Fail Blake • Arthur Stringer
... papers, it was enough. Notices stuck in the Venetian Mirror (the desecration!) for meetings of this and that society, and all of them, so he judged, just excuses for putting unwanted fingers into unwanted, dangerous pies. He thought of it like that—he could not help it; he saw too far into motive and internal action; was too impatient of the little storms, the paltry, tea-cup things. She, with her unique gift of serenity—her place was not among the busybodies grinding axes that were better blunt; interfering with the slow, slow working of the Mills of God. Her gift was example—rare ...
— The Best British Short Stories of 1922 • Edward J. O'Brien and John Cournos, editors
... Susanna feel herself obliged to caution me as to this Captain De Baron? She had no motive. She is not wicked." ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope
... sorrow, the Grecian sense of moderation forbids. The deepest anguish must mingle with his consciousness of fame, and punish his insolence. That glorification is the will of Zeus; and in the spirit of the ancient mythus, a motive for it is assigned in a divine legend. The sea-goddess Thetis, who was, according to the Phthiotic mythus, wedded to the mortal Peleus, saved Zeus, by calling up the giant Briareus or AEgaeon to his rescue. Why it was AEgaeon, ...
— The Iliad of Homer - Translated into English Blank Verse • Homer
... are given in marriage, nor think that self-murder can help a man. What the end of all this tale may be does not yet appear; still I am certain that yonder Caleb will take no gain in hurrying down to death, unless indeed he did it from a nobler motive than he says, as ...
— Pearl-Maiden • H. Rider Haggard
... acquaintance. His talk rapt me to far other and earlier scenes, and I seemed to be conversing with him under a Venetian heaven, among objects of art more convincing than the equestrian statue of the late Queen, who had no special motive I could think of for being shown to her rightly loving subjects on horseback. We parted with the expressed hope of seeing each other again, and if this should meet his eye and he can recall the ...
— Seven English Cities • W. D. Howells
... of all relations, consequent upon quantity; as great and small, double and half, and the like; for quantity exists in both extremes: and the same applies to relations consequent upon action and passion, as motive power and the movable thing, father and son, and ...
— Summa Theologica, Part I (Prima Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... was far-seeing enough to realise that he would be less the mere creature of the Egyptian ruler with the smaller than with the larger salary, while he could gratify his own inner pride that no one should say that any sordid motive had a part in his working for semi-civilized potentates, whether Chinese ...
— The Life of Gordon, Volume I • Demetrius Charles Boulger
... eloquent description, "The melody may begin by pressing its way through a sweetly yielding resistance to a gradually foreseen climax; whence again fresh expectation is bred, perhaps for another excursion, as it were, round the same centre but with a bolder and freer sweep,...to a point where again the motive is suspended on another temporary goal; till after a certain number of such involutions and evolutions, and of delicately poised leanings and reluctances and yieldings, the forces so accurately measured just suffice to bring it home, and the sense of potential ...
— The Psychology of Beauty • Ethel D. Puffer
... opening that it could be shot across it at a point corresponding with the height of a tiger's heart from the ground—as well, at least, as that point could be estimated by men who were pretty familiar with tigers. The motive power to propel this spear was derived from a green bamboo, so strong that it required several powerful men to bend it in the form of a bow. A species of trigger was arranged to let the bent bow fly, and a piece of fine cord passed from this across the opening about breast-high ...
— Blown to Bits - or, The Lonely Man of Rakata • Robert Michael Ballantyne
... me the name of the person to whom you would lead me, your silence can arise from no good motive, and I might be justified in refusing to go with you ...
— The Purcell Papers - Volume I. (of III.) • Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
... around and took the edge off of the danger that had clouded the people's faces, which was the motive Jim had in view in making the joking remarks, for no one knew better than Jim did how necessary it is to keep a company in good spirits, and to keep them from dwelling on the danger ...
— Chief of Scouts • W.F. Drannan
... Lyman's crude persistence with Pearl. He danced with others now only when Pearl was firm in refusals. Wilbur to her jested with venomous sarcasm at the expense of Lyman. Women were difficult to understand, he thought. What could her motive be? ...
— The Wrong Twin • Harry Leon Wilson
... politics, which was by no means a part of Hay's plans. He had as much as he could do to overcome domestic friction, and felt no wish to alienate foreign powers. Yet so much could be said in favor of the foreigners that they commonly knew why they made trouble, and were steady to a motive. Cassini had for years pursued, in Peking as in Washington, a policy of his own, never disguised, and as little in harmony with his chief as with Hay; he made his opposition on fixed lines for notorious objects; but Senators could seldom give a reason ...
— The Education of Henry Adams • Henry Adams
... became noble, wonderful, super-human. So now he did not marvel at a slow stir stealing warmer along his veins, and at the premonition that perhaps he and this man, alone on the desert, driven there by life's mysterious and remorseless motive, were to see each other through ...
— Desert Gold • Zane Grey
... no unwholesome motive. As things stood, to delay his ordination would have been a stigma he did not deserve; and though he might have spent a year with advantage in a theological college, pupilage might only have prolonged his boyhood. ...
— The Three Brides • Charlotte M. Yonge
... such as no other American has ever received, but he remained from first to last the same quiet, deep-hearted, and unselfish man, whose chief motive was the promotion of human welfare. He had his faults and made his mistakes; but time has sloughed them all away, and there are few sources of inspiration which can compare with the study ...
— American Men of Action • Burton E. Stevenson
... so astonished and indignant at the suspicion hanging over him that he was almost released. How ever, indications of his guilt kept appearing, and baffled in my mind my first conviction, based on his excellent reputation, on his whole life, on the complete absence of any motive for such ...
— Maupassant Original Short Stories (180), Complete • Guy de Maupassant
... the aide, and stated the former's motive in making this visit. Cochise sat silent for some moments. At length, ...
— When the West Was Young • Frederick R. Bechdolt
... know that there's any motive." She met his eyes frankly enough, but with a musing air as if considering a new suggestion. "No; it's just a wish, no more. An hour ago it seemed to me that everyone was eager and happy; that there would ...
— Shining Ferry • Sir Arthur Thomas Quiller-Couch
... account of the place, the master, the regularity of the scholars, of an apartment secured for my reception, and, in short, whatever else might captivate my mother's opinion in favour of his scheme; and indeed, though he acted principally from another motive, as was plain afterwards, I cannot help thinking he believed it to be the best way of disposing of a lad sixteen years old, born to a pretty fortune, and who, at that age, could but just read a chapter in the Testament; for he had before beat my mother quite out of her inclination ...
— Life And Adventures Of Peter Wilkins, Vol. I. (of II.) • Robert Paltock
... Esperance's state of mind, but these were futile efforts. Madame Darbois could never approach the burning question; she hovered round it with such uncertainty that Esperance never for an instant suspected her mother's real motive in the long talks ...
— The Idol of Paris • Sarah Bernhardt
... a dreary journey. The motive which had sustained the girl in her former trip from the city to her home was lacking. The fatigue incident to travel, the unjust reception of her by her father, with the doubtfulness of his escape, and the uncertainty of what was to become of her mother and herself, now bore upon her with such ...
— In Doublet and Hose - A Story for Girls • Lucy Foster Madison
... early 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 power than steam. ...
— A Journey to the Centre of the Earth • Jules Verne
... 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 thee; and thou shalt know ...
— The Works of Mr. George Gillespie (Vol. 1 of 2) • George Gillespie
... place the half of my father's wealth in your possession. I have read your motive from the beginning, sir, and have only refrained from telling you my mind, because I make it a rule to have the good will of a dog, in preference to his ill will, when I can. But as your conduct to-day has removed the last thin screen from your real character, and revealed your naked depravity ...
— Ellen Walton - The Villain and His Victims • Alvin Addison
... these Men to perform them; that whereas Persons naturally Beneficent often mistake Instinct for Virtue, by reason of the Difficulty of distinguishing when one rules them and when the other, Men of the opposite Character may be more certain of the Motive that predominates in every Action. If they cannot confer a Benefit with that Ease and Frankness which are necessary to give it a Grace in the Eye of the World, in requital, the real Merit of what they do is inhanc'd by the Opposition they surmount in doing it. The Strength ...
— The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 - With Translations and Index for the Series • Joseph Addison and Richard Steele
... the opposition of electro-motive pairs of plates produces results other than those due to the mere difference of their independent actions (1011. 1045.), I devised another form of apparatus, in which the action of acid and alkali might be more directly compared. ...
— Experimental Researches in Electricity, Volume 1 • Michael Faraday
... at night to go next day; but in the morning, when the soft sunshine comes in at the window, and when we descend and walk in the garden, all our good intentions vanish. It is not simply that we do not go away, but we have lost the motive for those long excursions which we made at first, and which more adventurous travelers indulge in. There are those here who have intended for weeks to spend a day on Capri. Perfect day for the expedition succeeds perfect day, boatload after boatload sails away from the little marina at the ...
— Baddeck and That Sort of Thing • Charles Dudley Warner
... and mortification, I saw the blinds pulled down at every window of the Carlton library, and I felt that by our foolish curiosity we had caused this gathering of political opponents to hold their conference in the dark. It is quite true that neither I nor X. had any ulterior motive in our observation of the meeting at the Carlton Club, but all the same I cannot pretend that the use of the opera-glass was ...
— Memoirs of Sir Wemyss Reid 1842-1885 • Stuart J. Reid, ed.
... none. And, as Mr. Carmyle was debating within himself whether to kiss her now or wait for a more suitable moment, embarrassment came upon them both like a fog, and the genial smile faded from his face as if the motive-power behind it had ...
— The Adventures of Sally • P. G. Wodehouse
... 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 evil, and ...
— The Rainbow • D. H. (David Herbert) Lawrence
... weary and anxious, and his anxiety increased. He wondered if he had treated her unfairly. He ate without knowing that he ate, and drank without tasting. As the hours dropped past, as the motive of each act in the long series of bygone days presented itself to his view, he perceived how intimately the notion of having Tess as a dear possession was mixed up with all his ...
— Tess of the d'Urbervilles - A Pure Woman • Thomas Hardy
... it was!" I cried, with heated vehemence. "Be flames everlasting the dwelling of my soul if any other motive drove me to ...
— The Shame of Motley • Raphael Sabatini
... that if to-day a rich man stripped himself of all his possessions and obeyed the doctrines of the Bible by giving them to the poor, the Daily something or other would worry around until they found some interested motive, and the Daily something or other else would succeed in proving the man ...
— Nobody's Man • E. Phillips Oppenheim
... of time that were left free; these Ellen seized for her studies and used most diligently, urged on by a three or fourfold motive. For the love of them, and for her own sake—that John might think she had done well—that she might presently please and satisfy Alice—above all, that her mother's wishes might be answered. This thought, whenever it came, was a spur to her efforts; so was each of the others; and Christian ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Susan Warner
... various shops where the different operations are performed will be seen by examination of the plan. The motive power by which all the machinery of the establishment is driven, is furnished by a stationary engine in the very centre of the works, represented in the plan. It stands between two of the principal shops. ...
— Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851. • Various
... to suspect some sinister motive. He knew something of both the men—of their public character—he could not otherwise, as they were lords paramount of the place. But of their private character, too, he had some knowledge, and that was far from being to their credit. With regard to Roblado, the cibolero had particular ...
— The White Chief - A Legend of Northern Mexico • Mayne Reid
... to-day make a model steam-engine, and no one will contend that such a model was not made by himself, on the ground that it could not have been made either by him or by anybody unless Watt, with his exceptional genius, had invented steam as a motive-power. One might as well contend that a savage does not really light his own fire, on the ground that the art of kindling wood was found out by Prometheus, and that no one, except for him, would have had any fires at all. The truth is, it will ...
— A Critical Examination of Socialism • William Hurrell Mallock
... Led by this motive, he left his home in North Carolina to seek his fortune among the forest-clad mountains, whose summits he could see far-away to the west. With no companion but his horse and no protection but his rifle, he slowly and ...
— Stories of Later American History • Wilbur F. Gordy
... head-shakes, profound winks, unutterable contortions, accompanied this piece of sound advice; and Dent left the shop, having conveyed the impression which he meant to convey—that Scarlett had stolen some Bank of England notes, and that Dent for a private motive of his own, which it did not behove Higgins to inquire into, wanted to get ...
— A Girl of the People • L. T. Meade
... use if she is not coming?' the Dictator suggested—not to disparage the intelligence of To-to, but only to find out, if he could, the motive of that undoubtedly sagacious animal's ...
— The Dictator • Justin McCarthy
... which the coat was flung. Here sat Gibbes at the head of the table. Those on the left-hand side had their backs to the chair. I, being on the centre to the right, saw the chair, the coat, and the notes, and called attention to them. Now our first duty is to find a motive. If it were a murder, our motive might be hatred, revenge, robbery—what you like. As it is simply the stealing of money, the man must have been either a born thief or else some hitherto innocent person ...
— The Triumphs of Eugene Valmont • Robert Barr
... against him, on account of the small sum found in the treasury of the fort, which amounted only to 54,000 Rs. The prince was firmly persuaded that the Company had somewhere concealed a vast treasure, which had been his principal motive to push the attack of the place. He had threatened Mr. Holwell very severely unless this treasure were found, and dismissed him to consult with his fellow-prisoners. This was bad news, for it was evidently impossible to persuade Surajah ...
— Athelstane Ford • Allen Upward
... the way you ask of me; but the regard which I conceived for you the first moment I saw you, and which is grown stronger by the service you have done me, kept me in suspense as to whether I should give you the satisfaction you desire." "What motive can hinder you?" replied the prince; "and what difficulties do you find in so doing?" "I will tell you," replied the dervish; "the danger to which you are going to expose yourself is greater than you may suppose. A number of gentlemen of as much bravery as ...
— The Arabian Nights - Their Best-known Tales • Unknown
... superstition! It was a flying in the face of Providence! How could they expect to prosper, when they acted with so little foresight, rendering the struggle for existence severer still! They did not reckon what strength the additional motive, what heart the new love, what uplifting the hope of help from on high, kindled by their righteous deed, might give them—for God likes far better to help people from the inside than from the outside. They did not think that this might ...
— Warlock o' Glenwarlock • George MacDonald
... ambition excited the monks both of Germany and Greece, to visit the tents and huts of the Barbarians: poverty, hardships, and dangers, were the lot of the first missionaries; their courage was active and patient; their motive pure and meritorious; their present reward consisted in the testimony of their conscience and the respect of a grateful people; but the fruitful harvest of their toils was inherited and enjoyed by ...
— The History of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire - Volume 5 • Edward Gibbon
... derived from the Aeolipyla (olla animatoria) the invention of Hero Alexandrinus, which showed that the ancient Egyptians could apply the motive ...
— The Book of the Thousand Nights and a Night, Volume 2 • Richard F. Burton
... tell you not to take any stock in Jim's news! I knowed he was fibbin'. But—say miss. There's this about Jim. He don't ever take the trouble to make up a yam unless he has a motive. Now I'll bet Jim knows something about ...
— The Motor Girls On Cedar Lake - The Hermit of Fern Island • Margaret Penrose
... persuaded that you acted from your best judgment, and believe that your desire to preserve my property, and rescue the buildings from impending danger, was your governing motive; but to go on board their vessels, carry them refreshments, commune with a parcel of plundering scoundrels, and request a favour by asking a surrender of my negroes, was exceedingly ill judged, and, it is to be feared, will be unhappy in its consequences, as it ...
— Memoirs, Correspondence and Manuscripts of General Lafayette • Lafayette
... of wrinkles to gather across his forehead, which was always reckoned a sure sign that Thad Stevens was concentrating his brain power upon the solution of a knotty problem. "One thing sure, we can't very well up and inform him of the fact ourselves, or he'd understand the motive right away." ...
— The Chums of Scranton High Out for the Pennant • Donald Ferguson
... their hands behind their heads. "Two," and only their eyes showed that every lax muscle in each body grew taut. "Three," and then they moved, the two men like two pieces of the same machine driven unerringly by the same motive power. ...
— Six Feet Four • Jackson Gregory
... would, but suggested that unless he had some higher motive than the fear of being brought into trouble, he would in all probability continue as great a pickle as ever, if he did not go on from bad to worse. Indeed I read my chum a very severe lecture, which he took with perfect composure, feeling at the time that he fully deserved ...
— Salt Water - The Sea Life and Adventures of Neil D'Arcy the Midshipman • W. H. G. Kingston
... found in the flourishing cycle of stories which, while Bret Harte was celebrating California, grew up about the life of Southern plantations before the war. The mood of most of these was of course elegiac and the motive was to show how much splendor had perished in the downfall of the old regime. Over and over they repeated the same themes: how an irascible planter refuses to allow his daughter to marry the youth of her choice and how true love finds a way; how a beguiling Southern maiden has ...
— Contemporary American Novelists (1900-1920) • Carl Van Doren
... the humble capacity of a militia officer; but in those days the militia was not taken seriously by the nation, so the officers did not take it seriously either, and, after a brief trial, a great many of them resigned. The recognized motive for going into the militia was a social motive, and as I never had any social ambition it mattered nothing to me that there were a few men of rank in the regiment. I had not any real companions in it, ...
— Philip Gilbert Hamerton • Philip Gilbert Hamerton et al
... Barnave, show it still more clearly. The great chemist Lavoisier wrote to Priestley that if there had been some excesses, they were committed for the love of liberty, philosophy, and toleration, and that there was no danger of such things being done in France for an inferior motive. And this is the view of Jefferson on the massacres of September: "Many guilty persons fell without the forms of trial, and with them some innocent. These I deplore as much as anybody. But—it was necessary ...
— Lectures on the French Revolution • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... Primal Forces, who was about to settle her destiny for her; in which she stumbled almost on the truth. Miss Muller was quite aware of the fact of her brother's visits at the book-shop, and their motive. She glanced at her watch: she could give herself half an hour to find out what stuff was in the girl, though it hardly needed so long. "A good type of the Domestic Woman in the raw state," she thought. ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science - April, 1873, Vol. XI, No. 25. • Various
... Baker and Cub followed, wondering a little as to the motive of the boy's father. But they were not ...
— The Radio Boys in the Thousand Islands • J. W. Duffield
... imperfections are, at least, very convenient. So my theory is this: the people whom the age suits fairly well don't bother—I don't bother; the others do. It is these confounded glaring and unshorn anachronisms that upset everything. They go about flapping their ideals at you, and writing novels with a motive, and starting movements and societies, and generally poking one's epoch to rags, until at last it is worn out and you have to start a new one. My conception of the progress of humanity is something after the Wandering Jew pattern. Your average humanity I figure as a ...
— Select Conversations with an Uncle • H. G. Wells
... come when the mystery shall be manifest of its furthest north and south, and men resolve the secret of the uttermost parts of the sea: the poles also may find their Columbus. But the limits of that other ocean, the laws of its tides, the motive of its forces, the mystery of its unity and the secret of its change, no seafarer of us all may ever think thoroughly to know. No wind-gauge will help us to the science of its storms, no lead- line sound for us the depth of ...
— A Study of Shakespeare • Algernon Charles Swinburne
... all around; so whatever objects may be served by all the Vedas, may all be had by a Brahmana having knowledge (of self or Brahma).[144] Thy concern is with work only, but not with the fruit (of work). Let not the fruit be thy motive for work; nor let thy inclination be for inaction. Staying in devotion, apply thyself to work, casting off attachment (to it), O Dhananjaya, and being the same in success or unsuccess. This equanimity ...
— The Mahabharata of Krishna-Dwaipayana Vyasa, Volume 2 • Kisari Mohan Ganguli
... letter, and which I ever believed you to possess, has alone inspired the desire of calling your attention once more to those circumstances of fact and motive by which I claim to be judged. I hope you will see these intrusions on your time to be, what they really are, proofs of my great, respect for you. I tolerate with the utmost latitude the right of others to differ from me in opinion, without imputing to them criminality. I know too well the ...
— Memoir, Correspondence, And Miscellanies, From The Papers Of Thomas Jefferson - Volume I • Thomas Jefferson
... the elder. "I am not a cultivated man, and I don't even know how to address you properly, but you have been deceived and you have been too good-natured in letting us meet here. All my father wants is a scandal. Why he wants it only he can tell. He always has some motive. But I believe ...
— The Brothers Karamazov • Fyodor Dostoyevsky |
