"Cupidity" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... scarcely expect that; I certainly should not ask for it. But you know that despite enormous benefactions, the Jews as a race bear the stigma of cupidity and meanness. It is wholly undeserved. The sums annually devoted to charitable purposes, by such a family as the Elschilds—my very good friends—are truly stupendous. But the Elschilds do not seek the limelight. Mr. Rohscheimer, Baron Hague, Sir Leopold Jesson, Mr. Hohsmann—and ...
— The Sins of Severac Bablon • Sax Rohmer
... nothing to do with literary merit. Bad story writing is not a crime. Mr. Hall Caine walks the streets openly, and cannot be put in prison for an anticlimax. The objection rests upon the theory that the tone of the mass of boys' novelettes is criminal and degraded, appealing to low cupidity and low cruelty. This is the magisterial theory, ...
— The Defendant • G.K. Chesterton
... The Chinaman's cupidity was clearly excited by Bennett's offer, while the bare mention of the amount at stake was sufficient to ...
— The Exploits of Elaine • Arthur B. Reeve
... therefrom), notwithstanding order on order and some exemplary punishments, had been incorrigibly guilty of every excess. It had not only seized with violence all that its wants demanded, but destroyed in mere wantonness what did not tempt its cupidity. No vandal ferocity was ever more destructive. Those crimes, however, were not committed with impunity. Want, sickness, and an enraged peasantry, inflicted terrible reprisals, and caused daily a ...
— Napoleon's Campaign in Russia Anno 1812 • Achilles Rose
... while those with whom he was concerned did not, at any rate, more than half understand it. He could thus trade either on the timidity or on the ignorance of his colleagues. When neither of these sufficed to give him undisputed mastery, then he cultivated the cupidity of his friends. He liked young associates because they were more timid and less greedy than their elders. Lord Nidderdale's suggestions had soon been put at rest, and Mr Melmotte anticipated no greater difficulty with Sir Felix. Lord Alfred he had ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... immoral to insinuate accusations of personal interest and of pillage, against men who have serenely endured the sufferings of poverty, and whose life, accessible to all, has never betrayed either cupidity or the desire of luxury. It is immoral continually to proclaim, as the act of a whole party, the death of a statesman killed by an unknown hand, under the influence of the irritation produced by his own acts and by the attacks ...
— The International Magazine, Volume 2, No. 2, January, 1851 • Various
... harlots and mistresses publicly and continuously, within the precincts of the monastery and without. Some of them, who are covetous of honour and promotion, and desirous therefore of pleasing your cupidity, have stolen and made away with the chalices and other jewels of the church. They have even sacrilegiously extracted the precious stones from the very shrine of St. Alban; and you have not punished these men, but have rather knowingly supported ...
— Short Studies on Great Subjects • James Anthony Froude
... North African towns. These prisoners were used as galley slaves, and the life of a galley slave was generally so short that there was no difficulty of disposing of all the captives that could be seized. Cupidity, allied with fanaticism, gave this state of war a cruelty beyond conception: both sides displayed such undaunted courage and such fierce personal hatred as to make men wonder, even in that hard and bitter century. Those low-lying galleys, which were ...
— Knights of Malta, 1523-1798 • R. Cohen
... possibility of several well-to-do men building on the heights above the town, another season. Uncle Jason had a chance to sell his sheep-lot at such a price that his cupidity was fully aroused. But the buyer did not care to close the bargain if the town went "wet" in the Fall. Naturally Mr. Day's ...
— How Janice Day Won • Helen Beecher Long
... or eight hundred francs demanded of him—with which the peasant bought himself a morsel of land. When pious persons and vestrymen denounced the fraud, begging the abbe to consult them in future before lending himself to such cupidity, he would say:— ...
— Ursula • Honore de Balzac
... more rapidly. Roger Trew had remained on the beach to watch the movements of the supposed pirates. The boxes of collections were at once carried to a place of concealment which had been arranged, and a few other articles which were likely to excite the cupidity of the pirates. All things were now ready for commencing our march, but we were unwilling to begin it till we ascertained that we were really likely to be attacked. We were still in hopes that the pirates might pass by, or land on some other part of the coast where they were not likely ...
— In the Eastern Seas • W.H.G. Kingston
... creatures: all of them have behaved as honorably, perhaps, and trafficked as equitably, as any other body of men, white or yellow, would have done in the same situation and under the same circumstances. Dishonesty in trade is no prodigy, even in this country. To bring accusations of fraud, cupidity and cunning against human nature, is not libellous. I am persuaded that robbery,—well contrived, deliberately executed robbery,—is perpetrated in every community among ourselves, without any due estimate of its moral turpitude, by reputable merchants and traders upon ...
— Thoughts on African Colonization • William Lloyd Garrison
... purse to a poor friend or dependant, or the sight of it might not only stimulate their cupidity, or raise their expectations to an inordinate height, but prevent you from escaping with a moderate douceur by "the kind manner in which you slipped a sovereign into their hand ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Volume 1, Complete • Various
... cross-examined as to the lapse from honesty which had sent him to gaol, and he was reluctantly forced to admit, that so far from the theft being the result of an impulse to save his wife and child from starvation, as the Counsel for the prosecution had indicated, it was the result of the impulse of cupidity. He had robbed a master who had trusted him and had treated him with kindness. Having extracted this fact, in spite of Hill's evasions and twistings, Holymead straightened himself to his full height, and, shaking a warning finger ...
— The Hampstead Mystery • John R. Watson
... Channing, "that the hopes of the most sanguine advocates of emancipation have been realized—if not surpassed—by the West Indies." What! the negro become idle, indeed! "He is more likely," says the enchanted doctor, "to fall into the civilized man's cupidity than into the filth and sloth of the savage." But all these magnificent boasts were quite premature. A few short years have sufficed to demonstrate that the deluded authors of them, who had so lamentably failed to predict ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various
... first the war-hawks had cried, "On to Canada," for their hope of conquest was undisguised. "Agrarian cupidity," declared Randolph, "not maritime right, urges the war. Ever since the report of the Committee on Foreign Relations came into the House, we have heard but one word,—like the whippoorwill, but one eternal monotonous tone,—Canada, ...
— Union and Democracy • Allen Johnson
... the indignant nation and to the King's own injured sense of consistency. He had to try to extricate his master from the cruel dilemma, either of having been an accomplice in a scheme now denounced by himself as a pirate's conspiracy, or of having betrayed, out of cowardice and cupidity, a faithful servant to foreign vengeance. That is the meaning of the exordium of this pamphlet published in November by the King's Printers, Bonham Norton and John Bill: 'Although Kings be not bound to give account of their actions ...
— Sir Walter Ralegh - A Biography • William Stebbing
... and, while the annual tribute or rent was paid with regularity, the native princes had a strong motive for protecting the trading companies in their operations. But the display of barbaric splendor excited the cupidity of many of the agents of the companies, and the atrocities of barbaric tyranny aroused the indignation of others, and there came a time when interference in native affairs seemed ...
— Ten Great Events in History • James Johonnot
... after the temple of Solomon was finished, this sumptuous structure was doomed to destruction, like all the fading handiwork of man. Sin enervated the nation which should have protected it; while the immensity of its riches excited the cupidity of a neighbouring royal robber. It was plundered, and then set on fire; the truth of the declaration made by Job upon the perishable works of man was eminently displayed—'For man to labour he is born, ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... It was this: that every year in the Slave States of America there were one hundred and fifty thousand children born into the world—born with the badge and the doom of slavery—born to the liability by law, and by custom, and by the devilish cupidity of man—to the lash and to the chain and to the branding-iron, and to be taken from their families and carried they ...
— Speeches on Questions of Public Policy, Volume 1 • John Bright
... day tried another device to tempt this wily Arab, by offering 500 dollars, or L100, if he would defer his journey for a short time, and accompany us round the lake. This was a large, and evidently an unexpected offer, and tried his cupidity sorely; it produced a nervous fidgetiness, and he begged leave to retire and con the matter over. Next day, however, to my great distress, he said he was sorry that he must decline, for his business would not stand deferment, but ...
— What Led To The Discovery of the Source Of The Nile • John Hanning Speke
... as it seemed, to take out some articles which were necessary for his use at night; and displayed in the process several large bags—larger almost than the machine would have seemed able to contain—which were evidently full of gold or silver money. The cupidity of Conrad was excited by this view, and he would gladly have at once secured the prize even at the hazard of a personal struggle with the stranger; but the people of the inn (according to his account afterwards) were such as would have expected a portion ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume 10, No. 271, Saturday, September 1, 1827. • Various
... act upon the decision of the lower court. The teachers, on the other hand, defended their long effort in the courts, the State Board of Equalization, and the Legislature against the charge of "dragging the schools into politics," and declared that the exposure of the indifference and cupidity of the politicians was a well-deserved rebuke, and that it was the politicians who had brought the schools to the verge of financial ruin; they further insisted that the levy and collection of taxes, tenure of office, and pensions to civil servants in Chicago ...
— Twenty Years At Hull House • Jane Addams
... therefore, I set forth my cause with some vehemence, the Duke flew into the greatest rage conceivable. Being thus in anger, he exclaimed: "This is just the same as with your Perseus, when you asked those ten thousand crowns. You let yourself be blinded by mere cupidity. Therefore I shall have the statue valued, and shall give you what the experts think it worth." To these words I replied with too much daring and a touch of indignation, which is always out of place ...
— The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini • Benvenuto Cellini
... his eyes involuntarily, seeking for some occult refutation of the implied dishonesty of the boy he had trusted. He found himself gazing straight into the small shifty eyes of Lucretia's midget rider, and such a hungry, wolfish look of mingled cunning and cupidity was there that Porter almost shuddered. The insinuations of Mike Gaynor, and the other things that pointed at a job being on, hadn't half the force of the dishonesty that was so apparent in the tell-tale look of the morally, irresponsible boy in whose hands ...
— Thoroughbreds • W. A. Fraser
... except that our caravan may excite his cupidity, and he may be induced to delay us to obtain possession of its contents. However, we had better put this question to the Griquas, who probably ...
— The Mission • Frederick Marryat
... a study—all that was good and evil in her was aroused at the sight of the rich and costly jewels—vanity, cupidity, gratitude, tenderness. ...
— For Woman's Love • Mrs. E. D. E. N. Southworth
... first appear desirous of acceding to the request of the negro; but the latter appeared to press the point with so much solicitation and earnestness that the white ruffian, stimulated by feelings of cupidity, evidently began to yield. Five blacks were offered in exchange for me—so Brace said, and they were now squabbling about a sixth! The captain had, in fact, virtually consented to sell me—it was ...
— Ran Away to Sea • Mayne Reid
... The cupidity of the little wretch was at last overcoming his abject cowardice. I could see him making up his miserable mind. And I still flatter myself that I took only safe (and really cunning) steps to precipitate the process. To offer him more money would have been ...
— Dead Men Tell No Tales • E. W. Hornung
... can play them. Of course, the place was a social cesspool, generating a poisonous miasma and reeking with the stench of decayed and rotten moralities. There is no defence to be made for it. But what do you expect when false idealism and fevered ambition come face to face with catering cupidity? ...
— The Sport of the Gods • Paul Laurence Dunbar
... empire. A "king" with his entire tribe would engage to do military service in exchange for lands. More and more both the wealth and the weakness of Rome were exposed to the gaze of the Germanic nations. Their cupidity was aroused as their power increased. Meantime the barbarians were learning from their employers the art of war, and were gaining soldierly discipline. Their brave warriors rose to places of command. They made and unmade the rulers, and finally became rulers themselves. ...
— Outline of Universal History • George Park Fisher
... strapped outside, and scarcely one who had not at some time found this precaution useful. The city abounded with footpads and ruffians of every nationality and description, whose prices for cutting a throat or "rolling a stiff" depended on the cupidity of the moment or on the quantity of liquor their capacious stomachs held. Scores of killings occurred ...
— Arizona's Yesterday - Being the Narrative of John H. Cady, Pioneer • John H. Cady
... following we reach the lowest stage of what can still be called the conflict of opinion, and come to bare cupidity and vengeance, to brutal instinct and hideous passion. All these elements were very near the surface in former phases of the Revolution. At this point they are about to prevail, and the man of action puts ...
— Lectures on the French Revolution • John Emerich Edward Dalberg-Acton
... Christian states of Aragon and Barcelona, and harrying even the border lands of Castile. Among the enterprises of the Cid the most famous was that against Valencia, then the richest and most flourishing city of the peninsula, and an object of cupidity to both Christian and Moslem. The Cid appeared before the place at the head of an army of 7000 men, for the greater part Mahommedans. In vain did the Valencians implore succour from the emir of Cordova, and from their co-religionists in other ...
— Encyclopaedia Britannica, 11th Edition, Volume 6, Slice 3 - "Chitral" to "Cincinnati" • Various
... quest, Sholto departed over the bridge where the surly custodian still grumbled at his horse's feet trampling his clean wooden flooring. The young man rode a Spanish jennet of good stock, a plain beast to look upon, neither likely to attract attention nor yet to stir cupidity. ...
— The Black Douglas • S. R. Crockett
... Singh, and I am very glad to hear that your schoolfellow displays a wisdom beyond his years. You see, the world is far from perfection; and weak, wicked, foolish people might have their cupidity excited by the sight of such an object, with results that would be extremely painful to every one here. May I ask, then—by the ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn
... marriage of Earnscliff and Isabella was now removed, and the settlements which Ratcliffe produced on the part of Sir Edward Mauley, might have satisfied the cupidity of Ellieslaw himself. But Miss Vere and Ratcliffe thought it unnecessary to mention to Earnscliff that one great motive of Sir Edward, in thus loading the young pair with benefits, was to expiate his having, many years before, shed the blood of his ...
— The Black Dwarf • Sir Walter Scott
... but only growled; and the threatening phalanx of sulphur-charged clouds rolled away, and melted into the quiet uniform tint which usually precedes sun-set. Dinner being dispatched, I rose to make a thorough examination of the ruins which had survived ... not only the Revolution, but the cupidity of the present owner of the soil—who is a rich man, living at Rouen—and who loves to dispose of any portion of the stone, whether standing or prostrate, for the sake of the lucre, however trifling, which arises from the sale. Surely the whole corporation of the city ...
— A Bibliographical, Antiquarian and Picturesque Tour in France and Germany, Volume One • Thomas Frognall Dibdin
... the English rendered the conquest of Canada inevitable and sure. The possession of that vast country of Canada, after so much blood, and such immense expenses it had cost the English in these different expeditions, excited too much the cupidity of the English to consent to a peace upon reasonable conditions, and induced them to extend their conquest to ...
— The Campaign of 1760 in Canada - A Narrative Attributed to Chevalier Johnstone • Chevalier Johnstone
... were rich His preaching might be ascribed to cupidity. Wherefore Jerome says on Matt. 10:9, that if the disciples had been possessed of wealth, "they had seemed to preach for gain, not for the salvation of mankind." And the same reason applies ...
— Summa Theologica, Part III (Tertia Pars) - From the Complete American Edition • Thomas Aquinas
... disgraceful to human nature, much more to any Christian community. History apprizes me that, in such a warfare, some of the best of men have not triumphed until long after they slept in death, when the hand of time and the researches of impartial history did them that justice which the cupidity and jealousies of powerful contemporaries denied them. I know not the present result of existing combinations against myself. On that point I feel little concern, though I am keenly alive to their influence upon my public usefulness. I engaged in the Union, ...
— The Story of My Life - Being Reminiscences of Sixty Years' Public Service in Canada • Egerton Ryerson
... bill, which Blindway had left at the Waldorf Hotel for him, and while he waited—the room being empty just then save for an old gentleman who read The Times in a far corner—he unfolded and took a surreptitious glance at it, chuckling to himself at the thought of the cupidity which its contents and promises would arouse in the breasts of the many thousands of folk ...
— The Rayner-Slade Amalgamation • J. S. Fletcher
... quaint style, and close incorporation with the pile, caused us to think them, at first, a part of the edifice itself. This desecration of the Gothic is of very frequent occurrence on the continent of Europe, taking its rise in the straitened limits of fortified towns, the cupidity of churchmen, and the general indifference to knowledge, and, consequently, to taste, which depressed the ages that immediately followed the construction ...
— Recollections of Europe • J. Fenimore Cooper
... dazzled eyes of the French ambassadors. Unfortunately the presents which he gave them on their departure seemed to them poor and insignificant, after the marvels which they had seen in the Castello, and their cupidity was but ill-satisfied. ...
— Beatrice d'Este, Duchess of Milan, 1475-1497 • Julia Mary Cartwright
... loyalty to womanhood than in the three-to-one vote for woman suffrage in Washington in 1910. Following close upon it comes the signal victory of California, where as never before were the friends and foes of woman's freedom so equally lined up. Wherever vice, corruption and cupidity held sway, there the vote for woman suffrage was weak. Wherever refinement, education, industry and self-respecting manhood and womanhood dwelt, there the vote in favor of women was strong. These are the battles ...
— The History of Woman Suffrage, Volume V • Ida Husted Harper
... before the existing prohibition."[112] The act, which became a law April 20, 1818,[113] was a poorly constructed compromise, which virtually acknowledged the failure of efforts to control the trade, and sought to remedy defects by pitting cupidity against cupidity, informer against thief. One-half of all forfeitures and fines were to go to the informer, and penalties for violation were ...
— The Suppression of the African Slave Trade to the United States of America - 1638-1870 • W. E. B. Du Bois
... prison doors only to close them the faster on others who may or may not have been my friends—or did he imagine he had found in me a Massey to be moulded and manipulated into the service of the crown, or a Corridon to have cowardice and cupidity made the incentives to his baseness. I only wonder how the interview ended as it did; but I knew I was a prisoner, and self-respect preserved my patience and secured his safety. Great, my lords, as have been ...
— Speeches from the Dock, Part I • Various
... General felt eager to test his discovery in a campaign, and, happening to have a quarrel with a politician in the neighbouring state, did his utmost to excite hostile feeling against Kalaya. On the other hand, the Kalayan official, his cupidity excited by the profits already arising from his invention, desired nothing better than some stirring event which would lead to still greater demand for the news-sheets he distributed, and so he also was led to the idea of stirring up international strife. To be brief, these intrigues ...
— The Crown of Life • George Gissing
... violate the laws of Nature, but, said he, "If you like to stay a day or two I will introduce you to one or two who have money to fling away." And he introduced him to Mr. Merton. Now that worthy had a fair stock of latent cupidity, and Mr. Clinton was the man to ...
— It Is Never Too Late to Mend • Charles Reade
... moment," said Dubois, who amused himself by exciting that cupidity which any but a peasant would have concealed; "we will make ...
— The Regent's Daughter • Alexandre Dumas (Pere)
... sufficiently to permit him to talk to his guest with some brightness. He told Colwyn a story of a seagoing ancestor of his who had entertained the Royal Family in his own frigate at Portsmouth in honour of Sir Horatio Nelson's victory of the Nile, and how the occasion had tempted the cupidity of his own fellow to make a nefarious penny by permitting the rabble of the town to take peeps at the guests through one of the port-holes. It happened that one Jack Tar, eager to gaze on his idol Nelson, got his head jammed in the port-hole, and broke up the party with a ...
— The Hand in the Dark • Arthur J. Rees
... always been his friend. The language of Dover, who is a sort of jackal to Brougham, clearly indicates the desire of that worthy to get rid of Lord Grey and put himself in his place. All these little squabbles elicit some disparaging remarks on Lord Grey's weakness, folly, or cupidity. Haeret lateri—the offer of the Attorney-Generalship, and the day of vengeance is ...
— The Greville Memoirs - A Journal of the Reigns of King George IV and King William IV, Vol. II • Charles C. F. Greville
... perhaps finish their life in a workhouse. He took a piece of gold out of his belt and told her there was enough in it to pay all their debts, and after that there would be some left for himself. The sight of the gold and jewels excited the woman's cupidity, and when the sailor was fast asleep she woke her husband, told him what had happened, and suggested that they should murder the sailor and bury his body next day in the garden. The farmer was very unwilling, but his wife at length persuaded him to go with her. Finding the sailor still ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor
... did Pembroke, Arundel, Hereford, and the husbands of the three Gloucester co-heiresses. There was a braver show of earls than even in 1314. An offer of lands, when Scotland was conquered, attracted a large number of volunteer infantry, while the cupidity of the seamen was appealed to by a promise of ample plunder. In August the host and fleet moved northwards, and closely ...
— The History of England - From the Accession of Henry III. to the Death of Edward III. (1216-1377) • T.F. Tout
... right hand in the whole village would busy itself pinching the "gum-elastic" tires and pedal-rubbers, twirling the pedals, feeling spokes, backbone, and forks, and critically examining and commenting upon every visible portion of the mechanism; and who knows but that the latent cupidity of some easy-conscienced villager might be aroused at the unusual sight of so much "silver" standing around loose (the natives hereabout don't even ask whether the nickelled parts of the bicycle are silver or not; they take it for granted to be so), and ...
— Around the World on a Bicycle V1 • Thomas Stevens
... deserve their sufferings. We have been accused of misleading English cruisers by false information, of being liars to an unusual degree, and of manifesting a grasping love of gold, beyond the ordinary cupidity of man. Now, I will ask our accusers, if it were at all extraordinary that they who felt themselves daily aggrieved, should resort to the means within their power to avenge themselves? As for veracity, no one who has reached my present time of life, can be ignorant ...
— Miles Wallingford - Sequel to "Afloat and Ashore" • James Fenimore Cooper
... flowers in legislative blackmail? The truth of the matter is that Marshall's decision has been condemned by ill-informed or ill-intentioned critics for evils which are much more simply and much more adequately explained by general human cupidity and by the power inherent in capital. These are evils which have been experienced quite as fully in other countries which never heard of ...
— John Marshall and the Constitution - A Chronicle of the Supreme Court, Volume 16 In The - Chronicles Of America Series • Edward S. Corwin
... their heads. It must in fairness be explained that they were for the most part possessors of obstinate hens that would not lay eggs. Eggs were firm at twenty-five shillings a dozen, and the hen that remained so contemptuous of mammon, so unredeemed by cupidity, so unmoved by the "golden" opportunity, most certainly deserved death. Therefore it was that an odd tough member of the feathered tribe was now and then discussed in secret. There was little conviviality about these gatherings assembled in back rooms where the light could burn with ...
— The Siege of Kimberley • T. Phelan
... and in love with Marie Mencini, he once offended her mortally by bestowing a similar bracelet upon a young stranger at the court. I dare wager it required a whole set of jewels to put the haughty Marie in good humor and satisfy her Italian cupidity. ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... pounding, tumultuous heart! But I was smiling calmly. And I tried to put into my voice a shrewd note of cupidity. "I really know very little about this treasure, Miko. If there were a million or two of gold leaf in it ...
— Brigands of the Moon • Ray Cummings
... exercising authority among your follow-men—the noble and most Christian moral of that heathen book is this: that the path to solid and beneficent influence over our fellow-men lies, not through brute force, not through cupidity, but through the highest morality; through justice, truthfulness, humanity, self-denial, modesty, courtesy, and all which makes man or woman lovely in the eyes of mortals or ...
— Historical Lectures and Essays • Charles Kingsley
... indulgence of the last day or two had inclined him to prefer sums of ready money. Once elected, Quarrier would not submit to social disgrace for the sake of a thousand pounds—nor for two thousand—possibly not for five. Cupidity had taken hold upon Northway. With a few thousands in his pocket, he might aim at something more to his taste than a life of trading. Five thousand it should be, not a penny less! This time he was not to be fobbed off with ...
— Denzil Quarrier • George Gissing
... over-populated. In Canada and Australasia there is probably room for nearly 200,000,000 people. These countries are remarkably healthy for Northern Europeans; there is no reason why they should not be as rich and powerful as the United States are now. We hope that we have saved the Empire from German cupidity—for the time; but we cannot tell how long we may be undisturbed. It would be criminal folly not to make the most of the respite granted us, by peopling our Dominions with our own stock, while yet there is time. This, however, cannot be done by casual and undirected ...
— Outspoken Essays • William Ralph Inge
... lasted some thirty years [109], was a middle-aged man with a large round head closely shaven, a bull neck, a thin red beard, handsome features which beamed with benevolence, and a reputation for wiliness and cupidity. Upon their arrival at Boulak, the port of Cairo. Khudabakhsh, who lived there, invited Burton to stay with him. Hindu-like, Khudabakhsh wanted his guest to sit, talk, smoke, and sip sherbet all day. But this Burton could not endure. ...
— The Life of Sir Richard Burton • Thomas Wright
... going to the market, Thamar went out and started for the King's palace, her cupidity not having allowed her to forget his promise. She had provided herself with a great bag of coarse cloth which she proposed to ...
— The Works of Theophile Gautier, Volume 5 - The Romance of a Mummy and Egypt • Theophile Gautier
... down before him and blessed him as he passed. England has had many heroes; but never one who so entirely possessed the love of his fellow-countrymen as Nelson. All men knew that his heart was as humane as it was fearless; that there was not in his nature the slightest alloy of selfishness or cupidity; but that with perfect and entire devotion he served his country with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his strength; and, therefore, they loved him as truly and as fervently as he loved England. They pressed upon the parapet to gaze after him when his ...
— The Life of Horatio Lord Nelson • Robert Southey
... into a sacred lake near Toulouse to cause a pestilence to cease. Caepion, who afterwards fished up this treasure, fell soon after in battle—a punishment for cupidity, and aurum Tolosanum now became an expression for goods dishonestly acquired.[599] A yearly festival, lasting three days, took place at Lake Gevaudan. Garments, food, and wax were thrown into the waters, and animals were sacrificed. On the ...
— The Religion of the Ancient Celts • J. A. MacCulloch
... that in 1838, five hundred thousand perished of famine, in a single district, in British India; and that too within the reach of English granaries locked up, and guarded by a military force! This is a fair sample of English benevolence; alias, English cupidity. And what says Allison the English historian of wretched Ireland? Her history and her sufferings are familiar to every one. He avows the opinion, in his History of Europe, "that it would be a real blessing to its inhabitants, in lieu of the ...
— A Review of Uncle Tom's Cabin - or, An Essay on Slavery • A. Woodward
... shall have forever lost the sympathies and the affections of the only nation on whose sympathies and affections she has a natural claim. In making that calculation she will do well to remember that in the controversy she proposes to open we shall be actuated by neither pride, nor passion, nor cupidity, nor ambition; but we shall stand simply on the principle of self-preservation, and that our cause will involve the independence of nations and the ...
— The Papers And Writings Of Abraham Lincoln, Complete - Constitutional Edition • Abraham Lincoln
... cupboard in which I had a quantity of jewelry and precious stones. This beautiful crown was the constant object of my thoughts, my affections and my preference; but I only looked at it myself at long intervals, every six months, very briefly, for fear of exciting the cupidity of servants, and exposing the glory ...
— The Memoirs of Madame de Montespan, Complete • Madame La Marquise De Montespan
... stir up the Maoris of the Bay of Islands to claim the restitution of their lands. Nothing but their strong affection and loyalty towards "Te Wiremu" could have enabled them to resist this appeal to their cupidity. But underhand dealing was the one thing that Williams could not bear, and he would hold no more communication with Governor Grey on the subject. His sons were of age: let them carry on ...
— A History of the English Church in New Zealand • Henry Thomas Purchas
... shirt-front, and once more placed his heels on the railing. The longer Tom talked with him the more he admired him, and the more he detested his avocation. The idea that such a man as that should deliberately prey upon the cupidity of his neighbors! But, then, if he was a gambler, he was the only man in the whole lot of passengers who had taken to him. There were a number of finely dressed planters who sat at the table with him, but not one had had a word to say to him, and would have allowed him to go on ...
— Elam Storm, The Wolfer - The Lost Nugget • Harry Castlemon
... against you in this war. The Russians will have their patriotism and love of independence, all public and private interests, including the secret wishes of our allies. We shall have for us, against so many obstacles, nothing but glory alone, even without the cupidity which the terrible poverty of those regions cannot tempt." General Rapp, who was in command at Dantzic, had thought it his duty to inform Marshal Davoust of the alarming symptoms which he had discovered ...
— The Happy Days of the Empress Marie Louise • Imbert De Saint-Amand
... Republicans. It was vain to talk of serious revision or any other party measure in a divided administration, yet the President chafed under his inability to fulfill party pledges. The surplus continued to accumulate, to permit extravagance in Congress, and to arouse the cupidity of citizens. In his message to his second Congress, in 1887, Cleveland startled the country by devoting his undivided attention to this single topic. He set his party a text which could not be evaded, although there was even yet no reason to believe that a tariff bill could pass both ...
— The New Nation • Frederic L. Paxson
... the right, to meddle. My friend's laconic exposition only deepened the dramatic quality of the situation. For an author I had been singularly luckless in meeting drama in my life. I had often had my artistic cupidity excited by Mr. Carville, by the way he was continually having stimulating adventures of the soul. And what stirred me now was a vision of that sober, drab-grey little man, going about his business on the great waters, with this portentous cataclysm hanging ...
— Aliens • William McFee
... plantations. The fever was epidemic. Planters were destroying profitable cocoanut groves in order to replace them with rubber trees. Nearly every local resident was putting his last cent in rubber shares and the tales of suddenly increased wealth inflamed the imaginations and cupidity of every one who heard them. I mentally jotted down the names of one or two companies that are going to declare enormous dividends soon, but that's as far as I've ...
— In Africa - Hunting Adventures in the Big Game Country • John T. McCutcheon
... mind, that color was an accident affecting the surface of a man, and having no more to do with his qualities than his clothes—that God had equally created an African in the image of his person, and equally given him an immortal soul; and that a European had no pretext but his own cupidity, for impiously thrusting his fellow-man from that rank in the creation which the Almighty had assigned him, and degrading him below the lot of the brute beasts ...
— An Appeal in Favor of that Class of Americans Called Africans • Lydia Maria Child
... opened my eyes I saw the great Druid stones rising close above me, and two men on either side of me rifling my pockets. They found nothing valuable there, and were about to leave me where I lay, when I gathered strength enough to appeal to their mercy through their cupidity. Money was not scarce with me then, and I was able to offer them a rich reward (which they ultimately received as I had promised) if they would take me to any place where I could get shelter and medical help. I supposed they inferred by my language and accent—perhaps also by the ...
— After Dark • Wilkie Collins
... permit him to face the enemies of the French. 'Westward Ho!' was the cry of the Old World. From the time when the genius of Columbus accepted the theories of the earlier astronomers the imagination and cupidity of adventurous spirits had been excited by tales of 'far off Cathay.' One hundred years ago the protocol for this territory was signed; one hundred years of history has been written; a nation of three millions has expanded into an empire of eighty millions of souls. Our country has not only become ...
— New York at the Louisiana Purchase Exposition, St. Louis 1904 - Report of the New York State Commission • DeLancey M. Ellis
... is to say, extinguish self; love mercy, cut utterly away all the pride and wrath and all the cupidity that make this fair world a wilderness; walk humbly with thy God, take his will and set it in the place where thine own was wont to rule. Pluck down the tyrant from his place; set up the true Master on His ...
— A Handful of Stars - Texts That Have Moved Great Minds • Frank W. Boreham
... grinding navigation laws of the monopolists. The little vessels, trading between North Carolinia and New England, brought many articles to the southern colonies, which they were incapable of producing. English cupidity envied them their small prosperity, and the navigation laws of 1672 were put in force. An agent of the government appeared, who demanded a penny for every pound of tobacco sent to New England. The colonists resisted the levy and the tax-gatherer became rude and had frequent collisions with ...
— The Witch of Salem - or Credulity Run Mad • John R. Musick
... build for thee A grotto altar of my misery. Deep will I scoop, where darkest lies my heart, Far from the world's cupidity apart, ...
— Silverpoints • John Gray
... their engineer's stupidity, Their haste, or waste, I neither know nor care, Or some contractor's personal cupidity, Saving his soul by cheating in the ware Of homicide, but there was no solidity In the new batteries erected there; They either miss'd, or they were never miss'd, And added ...
— Don Juan • Lord Byron
... had not reckoned on the cupidity of his host. His capture had been planned not by hatred, but in the hope of ransom, as was explained to him by the brigand chief, into whose presence he was led upon his ...
— Romance of Roman Villas - (The Renaissance) • Elizabeth W. (Elizbeth Williams) Champney
... Kalman, and departed. He had forty miles before him, and his horse was none of the best. Rosenblatt had two hours' lead and was, doubtless, well mounted. There was a chance, however, that he would take the journey by easy stages. But a tail chase is a long chase, especially when cupidity and hate are spurring on the pursued. Five hours' hard riding brought Brown to the wide plain upon which stood the Fort. As he entered upon the plain, he discovered his man a few miles before him. At almost the same instant of his discovery, Rosenblatt ...
— The Foreigner • Ralph Connor
... part they were regarded and treated very much as beasts hunted for the sake of their skins, or of a valuable secretion peculiar to their species. The Jews showed a talent for accumulating what was an object of more immediate desire to Christians than animal oils or well-furred skins, and their cupidity and avarice were found at once particularly hateful and particularly useful: hateful when seen as a reason for punishing them by mulcting or robbery, useful when this retributive process could be successfully carried forward. Kings and emperors naturally were ...
— Impressions of Theophrastus Such • George Eliot
... hissing time and clap at applauding time; yes, upon the way you stage your finance plays depends their success." The fact is that by no other method could this scenic artist of finance have set his plans moving so rapidly. The man had calculated to a nicety on the romantic cupidity he aroused. ...
— Frenzied Finance - Vol. 1: The Crime of Amalgamated • Thomas W. Lawson
... necessary, by an absolute prohibition of child-work, the State would be keeping well within the powers which the strictest individualist would assign to it, as it would be merely protecting the rising generation against the cupidity of parents and the encroachments of ...
— Problems of Poverty • John A. Hobson
... eyes hard with anger and cupidity, points) Who's to pay for that? Ten shillings. You're ...
— Ulysses • James Joyce
... he vomited out the stone first, as he had swallowed it last."(2) The swallowed children emerged alive, and Zeus fixed the stone at Pytho (Delphi), where Pausanias(3) had the privilege of seeing it, and where, as it did not tempt the cupidity of barbarous invaders, it probably still exists. It was not a large stone, Pausanias says, and the Delphians used to pour oil over it, as Jacob did(4) to the stone at Bethel, and on feast-days they covered it with wraps of wool. The custom of smearing fetish-stones (which Theophrastus ...
— Myth, Ritual, and Religion, Vol. 1 • Andrew Lang
... the most famous stories in Roman history. Fabricius was a fine specimen of the sturdy Roman character. He cultivated his farm with his own hands, and, like his contemporary Curius, was celebrated for his incorruptible integrity. The king attempted in vain to work upon his cupidity and his fears. He steadily refused the large sums of money offered by Pyrrhus; and when an elephant, concealed behind him by a curtain, waved his trunk over his head, Fabricius remained unmoved. Such respect did his conduct inspire, that Pyrrhus attempted to persuade ...
— A Smaller History of Rome • William Smith and Eugene Lawrence
... great loss to all classes of people throughout the Union, except one." Later he said, in excuse of the action, "We had to yield, we did not yield until we found that the country must be lost or the banks gratified, and we have sought to save the country in spite of the cupidity ...
— Usury - A Scriptural, Ethical and Economic View • Calvin Elliott
... the little treat which the good-natured magnate provided for them. It is quite otherwise with the mob of stay-at-home gamblers; they do not care a rush for the horses; they long, with all the crazy greed of true dupes, to gain money without working for it, and that is where the mischief comes in. Cupidity, mean anxieties, unwholesome excitements, gradually sap the morality of really sturdy fellows—the last shred of manliness is torn away, and the ordinary human intelligence is replaced by repulsive vulpine cunning. If you can look at a little ...
— The Ethics of Drink and Other Social Questions - Joints In Our Social Armour • James Runciman
... about, their faces lighted up as for holy war, with a smoke of cupidity. How disentangle the passion for equality from the passion of cupidity, when begins the fight for equality of possessions? But the God was the machine. Each man claimed equality in the Godhead of the great productive machine. ...
— Women in Love • D. H. Lawrence
... only with dire disaster. Fain would he have patched up the quarrel between Naples and the papacy by mutual concessions, because he foresaw what would happen if the colossal northern powers had their cupidity aroused regarding Italy, and learned how defenceless she really was. Because he foresaw so clearly the horrors of the invasion of 1494 and 1527, he acted as he did, even toward those who were enemies ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Vol. 8 - The Later Renaissance: From Gutenberg To The Reformation • Editor-in-Chief: Rossiter Johnson
... and Newbern editors seemed to believe,—that the attack on Hatteras Inlet was sure to end in failure,—they nevertheless thought it the part of wisdom to prepare for the worst; and they at once began the work of concealing everything that was likely to excite the cupidity of the lawless Union soldiers. Remembering what their Mobile papers had said about the ragged, half-starved appearance of the Massachusetts troops who marched through the streets of Baltimore, they even hid their clothing and carted ...
— Marcy The Blockade Runner • Harry Castlemon
... disturbed. I felt that the ground had dropped away beneath my feet. To be sure, everything was tranquil at present; but now I understood the source of that tranquillity and how soon it must fail. With opportunity would come more scheming, more speculation, more cupidity. How was I to meet it, with none to back me but a scared man, an absorbed man, and an ...
— The Mystery • Stewart Edward White and Samuel Hopkins Adams
... neighbors' houses, and his own and the whole world along with them, from taking fire. Apart from their conflicting interests, the two Empresses have privately a rooted aversion to one another. What with Russian exorbitancy (a Czarina naturally uplifted with her Tchesmes and Kaghuls); what with Austrian cupidity, pride, mulishness, and private trickery of Kaunitz; the adroit and heartily zealous Friedrich never had such a bit of diplomacy to do. For many months hence, in spite of his intensest efforts and cunningest appliances, ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XXI. (of XXI.) • Thomas Carlyle
... as an instrument of agitation is obvious. It appeals at once to two universal instincts: the instinct of cupidity and the instinct of universal justice. It stimulates the labourers to demand more than they receive already, and it stimulates to demand the more on the ground that they themselves have produced it. It ...
— A Critical Examination of Socialism • William Hurrell Mallock
... of the shadows of antiquity, from the morning of man's cupidity and avarice, two sinister figures have crawled with crooked talons through history, leaving a trail of blood and fear most horrible which has not halted yet. These are the monarch and the priest. The one is symbolical of despotic or oligarchic power, the other typifies the sordid ignorance ...
— Communism and Christianism - Analyzed and Contrasted from the Marxian and Darwinian Points of View • William Montgomery Brown
... the operations of commerce by debasing the coin of the realm to meet the exigencies of the state, was always in want of money. His cupidity was excited by the wealth of the order of Knights Templars, and, emboldened by his successes over the spiritual power, he now entered upon the career of intrigue which resulted in the destruction ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, Volume 07 • Various
... exclamation was scarcely arrested on his lips. He flushed deeply, then turned pale with excitement. For months past, flaring in all the public prints, that name had been advertised with every entreaty that humanity must regard, with every lure that might excite cupidity, with every threat that intimidation could compass. And here, in this sequestered spot, out of the world, as it were, among the remnant of an Indian tribe, of a peculiarly secluded life, of a strange archaic speech and an isolated interest, was craftily hidden the long-lost child. ...
— The Ordeal - A Mountain Romance of Tennessee • Charles Egbert Craddock
... incised or damascened daggers with hilts of gold or ivory, bracelets, necklaces, amulets of all kinds, enamelled vases, glass-work, stuffs dyed purple or embroidered with gay colours. At times the natives, whose cupidity was excited by the exhibition of such valuables, would attempt to gain possession of them either by craft or by violence. They would kill the men who had landed, or attempt to surprise the vessel during the night. But more often it was the Phoenicians who ...
— History Of Egypt, Chaldaea, Syria, Babylonia, and Assyria, Volume 4 (of 12) • G. Maspero
... man of superior talents and unbounded ambition; devoted, even fanatically, to his sovereign; his boldness approached temerity; he was artful of mind, wicked of heart, vindictive and unfeeling. His cupidity equalled the utmost excess of avarice, even in his thirty-third year, in which he died. He was too proud to receive favours or obligations from any man, and was capable of ridding himself of his best friend if he ...
— The Life and Adventures of Baron Trenck - Vol. 1 (of 2) • Baron Trenck
... been evident that the spirit which animates these pages is not utilitarian. It would be an error to suppose that the simplicity we seek has anything in common with that which misers impose upon themselves through cupidity, or narrow-minded people through false austerity. To the former the simple life is the one that costs least; to the latter it is a flat and colorless existence, whose merit lies in depriving one's self of everything ...
— The Simple Life • Charles Wagner
... knife in his teeth, better than a revolver for close work and entirely noiseless, the fellow began slowly and with great cunning to work his hand into the pockets of the coat. He found a long flat letter; this was what he was told to get. Now his cupidity was aroused. He had found nothing of pecuniary value, and he knew that this young fellow carried some treasures of value in the ...
— Frontier Boys in Frisco • Wyn Roosevelt
... killed us, and appropriated our goods without the preliminary ceremony of barter, the white men would not only decline to send them goods in future, but would organise a force to hunt down and slay the murderers: nevertheless, savages are not much given to prudential reasoning when their cupidity or passions are roused, and I cannot help thinking that we owed our safety, under God, to the belief in the savage mind that men who put themselves so completely in their power, as we did, and who looked so unsuspicious of ...
— The Big Otter • R.M. Ballantyne
... Sir John MacNeill, the British representative at the court of the Shah: "You must either travel as important personages, with a retinue of servants and an adequate escort, or alone, as poor men, with nothing to excite the cupidity of the people amongst whom you will have to mix. If you cannot afford to adopt the first course, you must take the latter." The latter they were ...
— Beacon Lights of History, Volume XIV • John Lord
... the depositories of the villa he had purchased for his pleasures. He, recollected that these gewgaws were placed in the bureau in the study; in which, as having a lock of foreign and intricate workmanship, he usually kept whatever might tempt cupidity in those frequent absences when the house was left guarded but by two women servants. Finding that Fanny had not yet quitted her own chamber, while Harriet went up to attend and reason with her, he himself limped into the study below, unlocked the bureau, and was searching in the drawers, ...
— Night and Morning, Volume 5 • Edward Bulwer Lytton
... say, go near to L80,000, as they are now weekly turning out from 700 to 900 tons of different sorts of meal.... I sometimes am inclined to think houses give large prices for cargoes imported for a market, to keep them up; it is an uncharitable thought, but really there is so much cupidity abroad, and the wretched people suffering so intensely from the high prices of food, augmented by every party through whose hands it passes before it reaches them, it is quite disheartening ...
— The History of the Great Irish Famine of 1847 (3rd ed.) (1902) - With Notices Of Earlier Irish Famines • John O'Rourke
... ancient prototype, Cartagena succumbed to the very influences which had made her great. Her wealth excited the cupidity of freebooters, and her power aroused the jealousy of her formidable rivals. Her religion itself became an excuse for the plundering hands of Spain's enemies. Again and again the city was called upon to defend the challenge which her riches and massive walls perpetually issued. Again and again ...
— Carmen Ariza • Charles Francis Stocking
... required that they should be delivered to it at low prices: the servants exacted more supplies than were wanted, and then sold the surplus for their own profit. In grotesque contrast with the disgraceful cupidity of his attendants is the exaggerated conception which James had formed for himself of the ideal importance of the royal authority, which at that time some persons attempted with metaphysical acuteness to lay down almost in the same terms as the attributes ...
— A History of England Principally in the Seventeenth Century, Volume I (of 6) • Leopold von Ranke
... as being without discipline, but ready to follow their captains blindly. They feared no fatigue, climbed the rocks like cats, slept in the open air, preferred tactics of surprise, and cared for nothing but the satisfaction of their cupidity. Some were dressed gipsy-fashion, with arms and breast bare. The bulk, however, wore a dress resembling that of the Morlacchi—tight hose, shoes of cord or rawhide, a red-brown waistcoat without sleeves, and ...
— The Shores of the Adriatic - The Austrian Side, The Kuestenlande, Istria, and Dalmatia • F. Hamilton Jackson
... fishes, when removed from their natural element, cannot live long on the land, so he began to pine when not in some post of authority which he was driven to be solicitous for by the squabbles of his troops of clients, whose boundless cupidity prevented their ever being innocent, and who thrust their patron forward into affairs of state in order to be able to perpetrate all sorts ...
— The Roman History of Ammianus Marcellinus • Ammianus Marcellinus
... to develop treacherous tendencies, and, once provided with a boat, it would be difficult to prevent them visiting our own particular island of Eden, when, if any of our possessions should chance to excite their cupidity, who could say what might happen? There was, of course, a way whereby this danger might be reduced to a minimum, and that was by so reducing the dimensions of the boat that she should be incapable of ...
— The Strange Adventures of Eric Blackburn • Harry Collingwood
... heroism; there have been criminals who held in check all the regular and legitimate forces of society, and whom one regarded with a mixture of terror and pity. There is nothing of that in Derues, not even a trace of courage; nothing but a shameless cupidity, exercising itself at first in the theft of a few pence filched from the poor; nothing but the illicit gains and rascalities of a cheating shopkeeper and vile money-lender, a depraved cowardice which dared not strike openly, but slew ...
— CELEBRATED CRIMES, COMPLETE - DERUES • ALEXANDRE DUMAS, PERE
... swarm again, more insolent and more rapacious than ever after their triumph of 1870, was not to be doubted. Everyone in France who had the slightest knowledge of the spirit that has animated the Hohenzollern empire knew its envy of France, its cupidity of France's wealth, its hatred of France's attractions for all the world. Everyone who came in contact with the Germans felt the bullet-headed belligerence of their attitude which they were never ...
— Foch the Man - A Life of the Supreme Commander of the Allied Armies • Clara E. Laughlin
... leaving blanks in many families hitherto unvisited by death. Among the victims was Richmodis, the beloved wife of Sir Aducht of Cologne, who deeply mourned her loss. The lady was buried with a valuable ring—her husband's gift—upon her finger; this excited the cupidity of the sextons, who, resolved to obtain possession of it, opened the tomb in the night and wrenched off the coffin-lid. Their difficulties, however, were not at an end, for when they tried to possess themselves of the ring it resolutely adhered to ...
— Hero Tales and Legends of the Rhine • Lewis Spence
... supposed that the sight of so many valuable articles had excited the cupidity of these savages, for, one morning, at half-past three o'clock, a party came off in large canoes with outriggers, and boarded the cutter when all hands were below. Their first act was to throw into the ...
— Narrative Of The Voyage Of H.M.S. Rattlesnake, Commanded By The Late Captain Owen Stanley, R.N., F.R.S. Etc. During The Years 1846-1850. Including Discoveries And Surveys In New Guinea, The Louisiade • John MacGillivray
... rose blankets, which the house afforded. Of these there was a good store and we left not a jot behind us. The nooks and crevices in the carioles were filled with smaller articles; several dozen of admirably finished case knives and forks; even a set of dessert knives obtained the notice of our cupidity. Articles of a lesser moment nor a thousandth part so useful, did not escape the all-grasping hands of the soldiery. In a back apartment there stood a mahogany couch or settee in a highly finished style. The woodwork of ...
— Picturesque Quebec • James MacPherson Le Moine
... and I managed to be pretty good friends. If I could be exchanged, or sent home, I told him that my mother would pay liberally for my ransom; and I suppose this idea excited the cupidity of the commandant, for a trapper coming in the winter, whilst I still lay very ill with fever, Museau consented that I should write home to my mother, but that the letter should be in French, that he should see it, and that I should say I was in the hands of the Indians, and should not ...
— The Virginians • William Makepeace Thackeray
... strangers to our groves would all eventually meet with the same fate as our rarer species and casual visitors—that is to say, they would be shot. There is no doubt that the amateur naturalist has been a curse to this country for the last half century, that it is owing to the "cupidity of the cabinet" as old Robert Mudie has it—that many of our finer species are exceedingly rare, while others are disappearing altogether. But it is surely not too soon to look for a change for the ...
— Birds in Town and Village • W. H. Hudson
... from alarms and stampedes. Time and again swift riders spread the news that the redskins had dug up the tomahawk and had gone on the war path. These scares arose from isolated murders by the Indians, whose cupidity could not withstand the temptations of the white man's property. It was not, therefore, until midsummer of 1855 that hostilities began in earnest. A federation had been formed among all the tribes ...
— Reminiscences of a Pioneer • Colonel William Thompson
... ways, but considerably polished by her frequent journeys to Paris. So far as her small keen eyes and pointed nose went her long face was not unpleasant, but its expression of good nature was marred by her hard mouth, her thin lips, suggestive of artfulness and cupidity. Her gown of dark woollen stuff, her black cape, black mittens, and black cap with yellow ribbons, gave her the appearance of a respectable countrywoman going to mass ...
— Fruitfulness - Fecondite • Emile Zola
... fruitless struggles or on wretched expedients. Thus she immediately guessed the state of this melancholy sexagenarian's mind, and the illusions which attracted him to her, and scented the spoils which offered themselves to her cupidity of their own accord, and divined under what guise she ought to show herself, to make herself ...
— The Works of Guy de Maupassant, Volume III (of 8) • Guy de Maupassant
... a long continuance in settled life. They get fond of the unbounded freedom and rude license they enjoy; and there is something in this wild mountain life checquered by adventure and peril, that is wonderfully fascinating, independent of the gratification of cupidity by the plunder of the ...
— Tales of a Traveller • Washington Irving
... Vernon set out with his dog, Dingo, to explore the center of Africa, guided by Negoro. The money which he carried had excited the wretch's cupidity, and he resolved to take possession of it. The French traveler, arrived at this point of the Congo's banks, had established his camp in this hut. There he was mortally wounded, robbed, abandoned. The murder accomplished, no doubt Negoro took to flight, and it was then that ...
— Dick Sand - A Captain at Fifteen • Jules Verne
... result of unforeseen, unforeseeable contingencies, as diseases or other events, considered the visitations of God! One, or two, or three, sick and heavy hearts and wounded minds, in the midst of a hundred happy, light ones, buoyed up by fierce cupidity and keen bargain-hunting, and exhilarated by drink and by fun, and all drawn together by the ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Vol 58, No. 357, July 1845 • Various
... only because the hospitality of the people has been damped by frequent communication with travellers, but, by intercourse with the semi-civilised merchant, their natural honour and honesty are corrupted, their cupidity is increased, and the show of firearms ceases to ...
— The Discovery of the Source of the Nile • John Hanning Speke
... that he had a family in England who would feel obliged to me for his release, and that his most intimate friend the English ambassador would move heaven and earth to revenge his fall, he directed my attention to a portmanteau passably well filled, which he hoped would satisfy the cupidity of my troops. I said, though with much regret, that I must subject his person to a search; and hence arose the circumstance which has called for what I fear you will consider a somewhat tedious explanation. I found upon Mr. Sheeny's person three sovereigns in English ...
— Burlesques • William Makepeace Thackeray
... superstitions of the masses, the subtler superstitions of the educated classes; gross materialism, bewildering Darwinism, pessimism, and degenerate political economy; on the other hand, unmitigated quackery and cupidity, with its weight of oppression on ...
— Valere Aude - Dare to Be Healthy, Or, The Light of Physical Regeneration • Louis Dechmann
... be; but they are Trevlyns, and that is enough for Miriam. It is not the gold she covets; it is vengeance upon all who bear that name. She stirs the avarice and cupidity of others, that they may do the work she wishes done. And she works in other dark ways, too. She has tools which few suspect, and she uses them for her own ends without scruple. And thou, foolish boy, blind and self willed as thou art, unheeding ...
— The Lost Treasure of Trevlyn - A Story of the Days of the Gunpowder Plot • Evelyn Everett-Green
... public clamor against it was never raised in the days of ancient slavery, nor is now in any country where Christianity is unknown. The opposition to it in our own country was a religious one; that we know full well; and so is the opposition of the American Abolitionists at the present day. If selfish cupidity, on the one hand, appeals to the New Testament for its continuance, so does philanthropy, on the other, for its abolition; and though in my judgment the inferences of the latter are far more reasonable, the mere fact that both parties ...
— The Eclipse of Faith - Or, A Visit To A Religious Sceptic • Henry Rogers
... Acquet made no secret of the fact that she was living with the Chauvels and that the son kept her informed of all orders received from Caen or Paris. Lefebre led the conversation round to the "treasure," for the money hidden at the Buquets had excited much cupidity. Bureau de Placene, as "banker" to the Chouans, had advanced the claims of the royal exchequer; Allain and Lerouge the baker—who showed entire disinterestedness—had gone to Donnay, and with great trouble got 1,200 francs from the Buquets; five times Lerouge ...
— The House of the Combrays • G. le Notre
... great pains to obtain correct information in respect to the production and exportation of the precious metals in and from this country. The Mexican policy has been uniform against the exportation of bars and ingots, though, from want or cupidity, special licenses have been given in violation of that sound policy and in gross violation of the rights purchased by the renters of the mints. This army is also interested in some prohibition, ...
— General Scott • General Marcus J. Wright
... the utmost discomfort to her relatives. It was known that more than one firm of publishers had made her tempting offers for her reminiscences, and the family looked on like nervous spectators at a battle while Cupidity fought its ceaseless fight with Laziness; for the Evenwood family had at various times and in various ways stimulated the circulation of the evening papers. Most of them were living down something, and it was Lady Kimbuck's habit, when thwarted in her lightest whim, to retire to ...
— A Man of Means • P. G. Wodehouse and C. H. Bovill |
