"Lucre" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... of any bribe from France, but the fact of "one million of gold" having been promised as the wages of their treason is asserted by historians. "These lords, for lucre of money," (to use the words of a manuscript[109] apparently contemporary with the event,) "had made promise to the Frenchmen to have slayne King Henry and all his worthy brethren by a false trayne [treason?] suddenly or they had beware. But Almighty God, of his great grace, held his holy ...
— Henry of Monmouth, Volume 2 - Memoirs of Henry the Fifth • J. Endell Tyler
... been at a standstill since last September. At the Bourse the transactions have been of the most trifling description, much to the disgust of the many thousands who live here by peddling gains and doubtful speculations in this temple of filthy lucre. By a series of decrees payment of rent and of bills of exchange has been deferred from month to month. Most of the wholesale exporting houses have been absolutely closed. In the retail shops nothing has been sold except by the grocers, who must have made large profits. Whether ...
— Diary of the Besieged Resident in Paris • Henry Labouchere
... understood too late, filled him with shame. How could he have been so wicked as to bring a girl upon such a quest in the company of an unprincipled Jew, of whose past he knew nothing except that it was murky and dubious? He had committed a great crime, led on by a love of lucre, and the weight of it pressed upon his tongue and closed his lips; he knew not ...
— Benita, An African Romance • H. Rider Haggard
... pain that he went howling up and down, and importuning every creature he met to lend him a kind hand in order to his relief; nay, he even promised a reward to anyone who should undertake the operation with success. At last the Crane, tempted with the lucre of the reward, and having first made the Wolf confirm his promise with an oath, undertook the business, and ventured his long neck ...
— Favourite Fables in Prose and Verse • Various
... over his head. He therefore opened the tomb, in which he found—of treasures indeed nothing, but the corpse, and an inscription to this effect: "If thou hadst not been insatiably eager for riches, and greedy of filthy lucre, thou wouldst not have opened the depository of the dead." So much for this queen and the reports that have been handed down ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Restricted to prose. Volume I (of X) - Greece • Various
... the cabin floor, or nailed crossways on the deck and then would sail away leaving ship and sailors to sink at leisure. The States gave chase as well as they could to the miscreant—a Dutchman born, and with a crew mainly composed of renegade Netherlanders and other outcasts, preying for base lucre on their defenceless countryman—and their cruisers were occasionally fortunate enough to capture and bring in one of the pirate ships. In such cases, short shrift was granted, and the buccaneers were ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley
... high horse when he speaks of that most detestable of cities. How may it fitly be described? May we not say that it has all the filth of the East, without any of that picturesque beauty with which the East abounds; and that it has also the eternal, grasping, solemn love of lucre which pervades our western marts, but wholly unredeemed by the society, the science, and ...
— The Bertrams • Anthony Trollope
... remained; nothing could have induced them to forsake their wretched habitations; they might be known by their thick pronunciation, their voluble and hasty way of speaking, the vivacity of their motions, and their complexion, animated by the base passion of lucre. We noticed in particular their eager and piercing looks, their faces and features lengthened out into acute points, which a malicious and perfidious smile cannot widen; their tall, slim, and supple form; the earnestness of ...
— History of the Expedition to Russia - Undertaken by the Emperor Napoleon in the Year 1812 • Count Philip de Segur
... in spite of the hot drink Germaine had given her. She was haunted by a horrible nightmare. She seemed to be lying on a bed of banknotes, whilst the Cochin-China, sitting heavily on her chest, reproached her bitterly for having handed her over to a stranger in exchange for a little filthy lucre. Mother Etienne, bathed in perspiration, seemed ...
— The Curly-Haired Hen • Auguste Vimar
... thousand went to a lobbyist to buy assemblymen.[1237] Within three days after its passage (April 5) the Governor had approved it, the Mayor had appointed Tweed to the position of most power, and Sweeny had taken the place of most lucre. Thereafter, as commissioner of public works, the Boss was to be "the bold burglar," and his silent partner "the dark plotter." A week later the departments of police and health, the office of comptroller, the park commission, and the great law bureau ...
— A Political History of the State of New York, Volumes 1-3 • DeAlva Stanwood Alexander
... lucre," said the man in black; "but does not grudge a faithful priest a little private perquisite," and he took out a very handsome ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow
... Sleeping Bard, or Visions of the World, Death and Hell," his translation of Elis Wyn's "Y Bardd Cwsg." The book would please Borrow, because in the City of Perdition Rome stands at the gate of Pride, and the Pope has palaces in the streets of Pleasure and of Lucre; because the Church of England is the fairest part of the Catholic Church, surmounted by "Queen Anne on the pinnacle of the building, with a sword in each hand"; and because the Papist is turned away from the Catholic Church ...
— George Borrow - The Man and His Books • Edward Thomas
... very fortunate as a people in that our material prosperity itself did not prove a greater curse. More than every other disaster was to be feared the growth of a temper for mere material thinking and enjoyment, the love of lucre and of those merely material comforts and delights which lucre can buy. There was among us quite too little care for the ideal side of life. Too many who purchased books loved them only for the money they cost. Rich ...
— History of the United States, Volume 4 • E. Benjamin Andrews
... need of lucre never looms so large As when 'tis gotten in some devious way: It mitigates the blackness of the charge That every nether ...
— Double Trouble - Or, Every Hero His Own Villain • Herbert Quick
... sort of young lady, whom he walked with: "Miss, though your father is master of a coal-lighter, and you will be a great fortune, 'tis true; yet I wish I may be cut into quarters if it is not only love, and not lucre of gain, that is my motive for offering terms of marriage." As this lover proceeded in his speech, he misled us the length of three streets, in admiration at the unlimited power of the tender passion, that could soften even the heart of a butcher. We ...
— The Works of Samuel Johnson in Nine Volumes - Volume IV: The Adventurer; The Idler • Samuel Johnson
... true, is the gift of Heaven —rules the court —, deep as first —is a boy Loved not wisely —and lost, better to have Loveliness needs no ornament Lover, why so pale Lover's perjuries Lower, he that is down can fall no Lucifer, falls like Lucre, not greedy of filthy Luster, I ne'er could any, see Lute, listened to a Luxury of doing good —cursed by heaven s decree —to be Lydian airs, lap me in Lying, this world is given to Lyre ...
— Familiar Quotations • Various
... only fair that you should pocket the lucre. I've had my share already. By-the-bye, when a man of the world falls into a bit of luck, has a few shillings extra in his pocket—I'm ashamed to speak of it, but there's a rule of conduct in the case. No treating, no ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 3 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson
... to enjoy it. 'Tis true that merchants pretend to say, after having heaped up something like a million, that they continue in business for the sake of the employment of time and excitement of mind that it affords, and not for the lucre of gain; "sed non ego credulus illis," or, in plain English, "they may tell that to the marines, the sailors won't believe them." The thirst for gain increases with its gratification, as I could quote more Latin to ...
— An Old Sailor's Yarns • Nathaniel Ames
... between them will ever engender a more ungovernable set of passions than are the usual lot of man; implant in him an irresistible impulse to some idle vagary, ... in short, send him adrift after some pursuit which shall eternally mislead him from the paths of lucre, and yet curse him with a keener relish than any man living for the pleasures that lucre can purchase; lastly, fill up the measure of his woes by bestowing on him a spurning sense of his own dignity—and you have created a wight nearly as miserable as a poet." This passage will recall ...
— Robert Burns • Principal Shairp
... all its old restrictions. North America, coquetting with philanthropy, and nominally abjuring the principle of slavery, suffered herself to undergo the corruption of the practice for the temptation of the lucre, and the Atlantic ...
— Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, No. CCCXLII. Vol. LV. April, 1844 • Various
... have been "an act" (as you convent girls say, Pollie). He would move along in his superb manner, looking right over the heads of the congregation, and disdaining to cast a glance at the "filthy lucre" that was being heaped up in the box which from obedience he carried. What were silver and gold, let alone the cheap paper currency of the times, to him, who had given up wealth and princely rank to become a religious! Yet, ...
— Apples, Ripe and Rosy, Sir • Mary Catherine Crowley
... hands, both for mine own living, and for those that are with me, when I have opportunity. And I trust that the Lord Jesus, who hath helped me to reject the wages of unrighteousness hitherto, will also help me still, so that I shall distribute that which God hath given me freely, and not for filthy lucre sake.'[187] Thus had he learned of the apostle to 'make the gospel of Christ without charge' (1 Cor 9:18); and upon this subject they strangely agreed. The same agreement existed between them upon the ...
— The Works of John Bunyan • John Bunyan
... people sold stocks again, until all the exchanges were once more swept with panic—and then put the money in their strong boxes, as if they thought that the mere possession of the lucre could protect them. They hugged the money and remained deaf to Cosmo's reiterated advice to ...
— The Second Deluge • Garrett P. Serviss
... the Rabbins have exprest, A cherub's face, a reptile all the rest; Beauty that shocks you, parts that none will trust; Wit that can creep, and pride that licks the dust. Not fortune's worshipper, nor fashion's fool, Not lucre's madman, nor ambition's tool, Not proud, nor servile;—be one poet's praise, That, if he pleased, he pleased by manly ways: That flattery, even to kings, he held a shame, And thought a lie in verse or ...
— English Satires • Various
... color-loving eye like a dream of plum-pudding after a nightmare of mince-pie. Through this magnificence had drifted, while yet the Leatherstonepaughs saw Rome in all its idealizing mists, generations of artists. Sometimes these artists had had a sublime disdain of base lucre, and sometimes base lucre had had a sublime disdain of them. Some of the latter class—whose name is Legion—had marked their passage by busts, statuettes and paintings that served to remind Signora Anina, their ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Volume 26, July 1880. • Various
... and with it there was a corresponding reduction in the depth of his bow. He must have begun to feel that he had been revering as a saint a mere man, who had not even risen superior to the lure of lucre. ...
— The Home and the World • Rabindranath Tagore
... with me. Let me be carried to the grave by my own men, rigged in the black caps and white shirts which my barge's crew were wont to wear; and they must keep a good look out, that none of your pilfering rascallions may come and heave me up again, for the lucre of what they can get, until the carcase is belayed by a tombstone. As for the motto, or what you call it, I leave that to you and Mr. Jolter, who are scholars; but I do desire, that it may not be engraved in the Greek or Latin lingos, ...
— The Adventures of Peregrine Pickle, Volume I • Tobias Smollett
... combat for my angel, there came temptation, sin, and vulgarity, in the form of this pale, cowed-down man, who stands beside my betrothed gasping with rage. The temptation of riches changed my angel into a demon, a miserable woman bartered for gold! She betrayed her love, yielding it up for filthy lucre, crushing her nobler nature in the dust, and driving over it, as did Tullia the dead body of her father. She sold herself for riches, before which you all kneel, as if worshipping the golden calf! After ...
— Old Fritz and the New Era • Louise Muhlbach
... Kang makes light of lucre and shows a preference for generosity. The foolish girl mislays her handkerchief and arouses ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin
... sure if ought below the seats divine Can touch immortals, 'tis a soul like thine: A soul supreme, in each hard instance tried, Above all pain, all anger, and all pride, The rage of power, the blast of public breath, The lust of lucre, and the dread ...
— Poetical Works of Johnson, Parnell, Gray, and Smollett - With Memoirs, Critical Dissertations, and Explanatory Notes • Samuel Johnson, Thomas Parnell, Thomas Gray, and Tobias Smollett
... winds with base lucre and pale melancholy! In the flames of the pyre these, alas! will be vain; Mix your sage ruminations with glimpses of folly, 'Tis delightful at times ...
— Horace • William Tuckwell
... this great rural improvement arises, we have reason to believe, not so much out of the actual lucre of gain as the fatal vis inertiae—that indolence which induces the lords of the soil to be satisfied with what they can obtain from it by immediate rent, rather than encounter the expense and trouble of attempting the modes of amelioration which require immediate ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction. - Volume XIII, No. 369, Saturday, May 9, 1829. • Various
... house of Harman Brothers. In short, to put the thing in plain language, we should, by stealing the widow's money, save ourselves. By being faithless to our most solemn trust, we could keep the filthy lucre. I will not say how I struggled. I did struggle for a day; in the evening I yielded. I don't excuse myself in the very least. In the evening I fell as basely as a man could fall. I believe in my fall I sank even lower than Jasper. I said to him, 'I cannot bear poverty, it will kill Constance, ...
— How It All Came Round • L. T. Meade
... thee, lord, but it concerns me just as much as my life. Since I wish that my wisdom should survive me, I would rather renounce the reward which thou hast offered, than expose my life for empty lucre; without which, I as a true philosopher shall be able to ...
— Quo Vadis - A Narrative of the Time of Nero • Henryk Sienkiewicz
... our spies do not boast of their service, but spy-hunting is a service that has no taint, and there is much satisfaction both to the conscience and intellect in routing out the underground worker who, for "filthy lucre," would sell the blood of his fellow man. The traitor and the spy have in all ages been rightly considered as foul beings who poison the air and whose touch contaminates. In Germany alone is the spy ...
— "Over There" with the Australians • R. Hugh Knyvett
... overshadowed Europe from the Mohammedan powers; and by soundly directed, though fanatical instinct, all Christendom rushed eastward, till the chivalry of the Seljuk Turks was crippled on the fields of Palestine. Now also the multitudes of Europe, uncorrupted by ambition, envy, or filthy lucre, forebode the deadly struggle impending over us all from the conspiracy of crowned heads. Seeing the apathy of their own rulers, and knowing, perhaps by dim report, the deeds of Kossuth, they look to him as the Great Prophet ...
— Select Speeches of Kossuth • Kossuth
... lives for a Christian purpose, or is it lucre you seek, Mr. Praiseworthy?" she enquires, giving the Elder a significant look, and waiting for ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams
... roadside is usually in memory of the victim of robbers, or, occasionally, of fatal accident; but when you see crosses, two or three together, in villages or towns, or their immediate neighborhood, they oftener mark the scene of some deed of bloodshed prompted by revenge, not lucre." ...
— The Actress in High Life - An Episode in Winter Quarters • Sue Petigru Bowen
... of Lucre know What riches from my labours flow?— A DREAM is my reply. And who for wealth has ever pin'd, That had a World within his mind, Where every treasure he may find, And joys that ...
— The Sylphs of the Season with Other Poems • Washington Allston
... nothing to countenance the view that Byron was ever really possessed by the "good old gentlemanly vice" of which lie wrote. The Skimpoles and Chadbands of the world are always inclined to talk of filthy lucre: it is equally a fashion of really lavish people to boast that they are good men ...
— Byron • John Nichol
... have sent him to India with an income of fabulous amount. And now they are astonished they cannot carry a Reform Bill. If they removed all those among their supporters who oppose such bills by preferring them to posts of great confidence and great lucre, how can they suppose that they will ever carry one? Looking at the policy of the government, I am not at all astonished at the speech which the right honorable gentleman, the Secretary of State, has made this evening. Of which speech I may observe, that although it was ...
— The World's Best Orations, Vol. 1 (of 10) • Various
... pow'r of Troy decline, Forsook the weaker, with the strong to join; Broke ev'ry bond of nature and of truth, And murder'd, for his wealth, the royal youth. O sacred hunger of pernicious gold! What bands of faith can impious lucre hold? Now, when my soul had shaken off her fears, I call my father and the Trojan peers; Relate the prodigies of Heav'n, require What he commands, and their advice desire. All vote to leave that execrable shore, Polluted with the blood of Polydore; But, ere we sail, his fun'ral rites ...
— The Aeneid • Virgil
... whims And restless nothingness; yet if we pierce The soul, may be we'll touch some cause profound For what seems causeless. Early love despised, Or baffled, which is worse; a faith betrayed, For vanity or lucre; chill regards, Where to gain constant glances we have paid Some fearful forfeit: here are many springs, Unmarked by shallow eyes, and some, or all Of these, or none, may prompt my conduct now— But I'll ...
— Count Alarcos - A Tragedy • Benjamin Disraeli
... sacrifice so largely to their dissipation or their vanity, that they have nothing left for mouths without food, and limbs without raiment! How far does it throw back into the shade those men of prosperous enterprise and gilded state who, in the hope of some additional lucre, have thousands and ten thousands at their beck; but who, when asked for decent contributions to what they themselves acknowledge to be all-important, turn away with this hollow excuse, 'I cannot afford it.' Above all, how should her example redden the faces of many who profess ...
— The Power of Faith - Exemplified In The Life And Writings Of The Late Mrs. Isabella Graham. • Isabella Graham
... popular notion of success stands in direct opposition in all points to the real and wholesome success. One adores public opinion, the other private opinion; one fame, the other desert; one feats, the other humility; one lucre, the other love; one monopoly, and the other hospitality ...
— The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table • Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. (The Physician and Poet not the Jurist)
... times Cleopatra and her suite were wont to enter from their state barges. Mac's rather hazy notions of that lady wrapped her in a halo of romance, and now he walked the lovely aisles which she had trod. Was it, he thought, worth while gradually to spoil this wonderful building for the sake of lucre ...
— The Tale of a Trooper • Clutha N. Mackenzie
... number. I had a kind of ambition to start a book-sellin' shop of my own and to make Linklater o' Paisley a big name in the trade. But I got the offer from Hatherwick's, and I was wantin' to get married, so filthy lucre won the day. And I'm no sorry I changed. If it hadna been for this war, I would have been makin' four figures with my salary and commissions ... My pipe's out. Have you one of those rare and valuable curiosities called a spunk, ...
— Mr. Standfast • John Buchan
... terrible than death, the infirmities of his temper and understanding had increased to such a degree that he was as disagreeable to Low Churchmen as to High Churchmen. Like too many other men, who are not to be turned from the path of right by pleasure, by lucre or by danger, he mistook the impulses of his pride and resentment for the monitions of conscience, and deceived himself into a belief that, in treating friends and foes with indiscriminate insolence and asperity, he was merely showing his Christian ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 3 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... the motive," said the stranger, eagerly; "he will know that you are doing this—not for lucre of gain, but to save the life of the innocent, and prevent the commission of a worse crime than that which the ...
— The Heart of Mid-Lothian, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott
... [References to Judas as the first hireling, to Simon Magus as the second, and to various texts in the Acts and Epistles proving that among the early preachers of Christianity there were men who preached 'for filthy lucre's sake,' or made a mere trade of the Gospel] .... Thus we see that not only the excess of Hire in wealthiest times, but also the undue and vicious taking or giving it, though but small or mean, as in the primitive times, gave to hirelings occasion, though not intended yet sufficient, ...
— The Life of John Milton, Volume 5 (of 7), 1654-1660 • David Masson
... materials—pottery and wood-carving, and bronzes. The last famous artist in lacquer, Watanobe Tosu, died about thirty years ago. Whether he is destined to have a successor or successors remains to be seen. These lacquer artists, as I have indicated, worked not for lucre, but for love. Attached to some Daimios household, they devoted their lives, their energies, their imagination, their artistic instincts to the devising of splendid work and the making of beautiful, ingenious, absolutely ...
— The Empire of the East • H. B. Montgomery
... the motive of Judas was totally different from the one hitherto supposed: it was not filthy lucre. The smallness of the price for which he sold his Master—it was less than four pounds of our money, though the value of this sum was much greater then—proves that there must have been another motive. The traditional conception is inconsistent with Christ's choice of him to be a disciple; ...
— The Trial and Death of Jesus Christ - A Devotional History of our Lord's Passion • James Stalker
... thought by many that he has been rather too prolix on the subject, but in order to know "How to enjoy Paris" to its full extent, the first object, is to be informed of the best means of dispensing one's modicum of lucre to the greatest advantage, which will enable the visitor to stay the longer and see the more, just in proportion as he avoids useless expenditure in suffering himself to ...
— How to Enjoy Paris in 1842 • F. Herve
... and things come to be estimated at their selling price, or according to the profit to be drawn from them. What brings nothing is worth nothing: he who has nothing, is nothing. Honest poverty risks passing for shame, and lucre, however filthy, is not greatly put to it to ...
— The Simple Life • Charles Wagner
... known it, of course. How that fellow toiled and moiled and gloated over his wretched diamonds! How little he seemed to think of the stain of blood on his hands, and how much of the mere chance of making filthy lucre! Pah! Pah! it was pitiable. The man's whole mind was distorted by a hideous fungoid growth—the love of gain, which is the root of all evil. For a few miserable stones, he would plunder his own brother, lying helpless and ill in that African ...
— What's Bred In the Bone • Grant Allen
... his fortune in the New World. On the insurrection of the Peruvians, he was sent to the support of Francis Pizarro, and was rewarded by that chief with a grant of land in Cuzco. Here he remained for several years, busily employed in increasing his substance; for the love of lucre was a ruling passion in his bosom. On the arrival of Vaca de Castro, we find him doing good service under the royal banner; and at the breaking out of the great rebellion under Gonzalo Pizarro, he converted his property ...
— History Of The Conquest Of Peru • William Hickling Prescott
... speak frankly, I do. Even in your cities I observe a feverish excitement, and a demnable race for what the Scriptures aptly call 'filthy lucre'; and the pastoral regions are—well—rough indeed. Your colonies are too young. In time to come, no doubt, the amenities of life will appear—for you have some magnificent private fortunes; but in the meantime one hears ...
— Such is Life • Joseph Furphy
... with the desire of distinction and promotion. The boast of the soldiers, as we find it recorded in their solemn resolutions, was that they had not been forced into the service, nor had enlisted chiefly for the sake of lucre, that they were no Janizaries, but free-born Englishmen, who had, of their own accord, put their lives in jeopardy for the liberties and religion of England, and whose right and duty it was to watch over the welfare of the ...
— The Best of the World's Classics, Vol. V (of X) - Great Britain and Ireland III • Various
... words, written against December 23rd, Sunday—(whilst the Waits, as usual, were serenading the semi-detached, in a full conviction of its being Monday, and the possibility of "living and loving together," and "being happy yet").—"To church with my new tenant, who is delightful company: Lady Lucre. says he is a 'refined duck,' a 'gentlemanly angel,' and a 'manly poppet:' to which I made answer, that I thought so too; and that she was a 'seraphine concert.' Sermon, by the Rev. Loyalla a Becket, 'in aid of funds for supplying the poor, during this inclement but festive season, with ...
— Christmas Comes but Once A Year - Showing What Mr. Brown Did, Thought, and Intended to Do, - during that Festive Season. • Luke Limner
... be given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre, not a brawler, not covetous, not a novice, not self-willed, not soon angry. See 1 Tim. 3:3-6; ...
— The Gospel Day • Charles Ebert Orr
... the yeoman, losing patience; "an thou dost go on to put thy filthy lucre in the balance with thy daughter's life and honour, by Heaven, I will strip thee of every maravedi thou hast in the world, ...
— Ivanhoe - A Romance • Walter Scott
... sense of right and wrong is forgotten . . . where the name of Jesus is scarcely ever mentioned but in blasphemy, and His precepts [are] almost utterly unknown . . . [where] the few who are enlightened are too much occupied in the pursuit of lucre, ambition, or ungodly revenge to entertain a desire or thought of bettering the moral state of their countrymen." This report, in which Borrow confesses that he "made no attempts to flatter and cajole," must have caused the British Minister some diplomatic embarrassment when he read ...
— The Life of George Borrow • Herbert Jenkins
... game, 300 points up, at the old three-ball style of billiards, for stakes of $100 a side, and I beat him by a score of 300 to 252, no account of the averages or high runs being kept for the reason, as I presume, that nobody thought them worth keeping, though enough of the filthy lucre changed hands on the result to keep some of my ball-playing friends in pocket money for ...
— A Ball Player's Career - Being the Personal Experiences and Reminiscensces of Adrian C. Anson • Adrian C. Anson
... earlier times of Rome the priesthood was a profession, not of lucre but of honour. It was embraced by the noblest citizens—it was forbidden to the plebeians. Afterwards, and long previous to the present date, it was equally open to all ranks; at least, that part ...
— The Last Days of Pompeii • Edward George Bulwer-Lytton
... Jehovah's hand received, And mourned in sorrowing tones that God their Judge Should be by them rejected: and they cried "A King! give us a King—for thou art old (b) "And in those ways thou all thy life hast walked "Walk not thy sons: lucre their idol is— "And Judgment is perverted by the bribes "They take to stifle justice: give us, then, "A King to judge us. Other nations boast "Of such a chief—a King, give us a King!" So Saul became the crowned of Israel— The first great King of ...
— The Death of Saul and other Eisteddfod Prize Poems and Miscellaneous Verses • J. C. Manning
... carried out if picked noblemen are brought over, who are prouder of the glories of war and honorable deeds for their God and their king and the world, and of the fame of them, and who have little lust for other gain or sordid lucre. ...
— The Philippine Islands, 1493-1898 - Volume VI, 1583-1588 • Emma Helen Blair
... any job of lucre to obtain, or of vengeance to perpetrate, their way is, to select, for the execution, those very persons to whose habits, friendships, principles, and declarations, such proceedings are publicly known to be ...
— Thoughts on the Present Discontents - and Speeches • Edmund Burke
... worldly gain, and in respect of the prospect it held out of comparative ease and comfort; for the parish was small and the emolument great. But as it is required of a bishop, that he be "not greedy of filthy lucre," nay, that he be "one who has no love of money" ([Greek: aphilarguros] 1 Tim. 3:3) at all, so was it true that in him these qualifications eminently shone. His remarks in a letter to his father contain the honest ...
— The Biography of Robert Murray M'Cheyne • Andrew A. Bonar
... to resist good virtue's common foe, And feare to loose some lucre, which doth grow By a continued practise; makes our fate Banish (with single combates) all the hate, Which broad abuses challenge of our spleene. For who in Vertue's troope was euer seene, That did couragiously with mischiefes fight, Without the publicke name of hipocrite? ...
— Microcosmography - or, a Piece of the World Discovered; in Essays and Characters • John Earle
... proceed then in your own system? Are you aware that an unworthy motive may be assigned for this rapid succession of publication? You will be supposed to work merely for the lucre ...
— The Fortunes of Nigel • Sir Walter Scott
... manufactured pebbles? It almost seemed so. For a moment, I admit, I was half inclined to suppose it. But next second I changed my mind. Could a man of Sir Charles Vandrift's integrity and high principle stoop for lucre's sake to so mean an expedient?—not to mention the fact that, even if he did, and if Mosenheimer did likewise, the stones submitted to the scientific men would have amply sufficed to establish the reality and success ...
— An African Millionaire - Episodes in the Life of the Illustrious Colonel Clay • Grant Allen
... gave them, the rats, a smile of recognition as he passed to his office, concluding, no doubt, by a natural process of ratiocination, that they were kindred spirits, because they delighted in bad smells and filthy garbage, just as he (Denham) rejoiced in Thames air and filthy lucre. ...
— The Lifeboat • R.M. Ballantyne
... already made by the help of this Instrument, that he thinks it to be one of the most wonderful that ever was in the World, if we speak of strangeness, and just wonder, and of Philosophical importance, separate from the interest of lucre. For (saith he in one of his Letters) who could ever expect, that we men should find an Art, to weigh all the Air that hangs over our heads, in all the changes of it, and, as it were, to weigh, and to distinguish by weight, the Winds and ...
— Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society - Vol 1 - 1666 • Various
... favorite mottoes,—"Aut viam inveniam aut faciam,"—to join one of the almost piratical expeditions of Drake against the Spanish settlements. Perhaps he might then be diverted from his design by the strong and kind warning of his true friend Languet, "to beware lest the thirst of lucre should creep into a mind which had hitherto admitted nothing but the love of truth and an anxiety to deserve well of all men." After the death of this monitor, however, he engaged in a second scheme of this very questionable nature, and was only prevented from ...
— Memoirs of the Court of Queen Elizabeth • Lucy Aikin
... attempt to grasp it, of a certain fragrance if we breathe in the air. It is the possibility of turning into a particular fruit, with the possibility of our finding that fruit bitter and non-edible; of being developed from cuttings, pressed in a book, made a present of or cultivated for lucre. Only one of these groups of possibilities may occupy our thoughts, the rest not glanced at, or only glanced at subsequently; but if, on trial, any of these grouped possibilities disappoint us, we decide that this is not a real rose, but a paper rose, or a painted one, or no rose at all, but ...
— The Beautiful - An Introduction to Psychological Aesthetics • Vernon Lee
... a religious field day here in the Sessions house of Castle Cumber; the whole thing is regulated—the seconds, and bottle houlders, and all is appointed. There's the Rev. Christopher Gammon, Rev. Vesuvius M'Slug, who's powerful against Popery, the Rev. Bernard Brimstone, and the Rev. Phineas Lucre, with many more on the side of truth. On that of Popery and falsehood there's the Rev. Father M'Stake, the Rev. Father O'Flary, the Rev. Father M'Fire, and the Rev. Nicholas O'Scorch, D.D. Dr. Sombre is to be second on our side; ...
— Valentine M'Clutchy, The Irish Agent - The Works of William Carleton, Volume Two • William Carleton
... world's enjoyments, That ever valu'd were, There's none of our employments, With fishing can compare; Some preach, some write, Some swear, some fight, All golden lucre courting, But fishing still bears off the bell ...
— History of English Humour, Vol. 1 (of 2) - With an Introduction upon Ancient Humour • Alfred Guy Kingan L'Estrange
... answered, "if you wish to reject my message, do it without insult. I do not sell the grace of God for lucre." ...
— Pearl-Maiden • H. Rider Haggard
... are very much alike in point of worth. The former are intolerable on account of their lies, their assumption, and their vanity; the others are equally odious by reason of their vulgarity, their stupidity, and their sordid love of lucre. ...
— Stories of Modern French Novels • Julian Hawthorne
... some trifling article, then, by ostensibly changing your mind as to having the change, so bewilder the shopman as to cheat him out of ten shillings. It is easily done by one who understands it. The professor does not practice this art for the lucre of gain, but he understands it in detail. And of this he gave such proofs to the tramp that ...
— The Gypsies • Charles G. Leland
... me, and send Lazarus, that he may dip the tip of his finger in water, and cool my tongue: for I am tormented in this flame," and in mortal terror they sprang up, dashed down their cards and fled, not even waiting to gather up the "filthy lucre" for which they wore selling ...
— Elsie's Motherhood • Martha Finley
... learning and knowledge, sometimes upon a natural curiosity and inquisitive appetite: sometimes to entertain their minds with variety and delight; sometimes for ornament and reputation; and sometimes to enable them to victory of wit and contradiction; and most times for lucre and profession,"—(that is, for most of those objects which are meant by the ordinary citers of the saying, 'Knowledge is power;') "and seldom sincerely to give a true account of these gifts of reason to the benefit and use of men; as if there were ...
— The International Monthly, Volume 3, No. 2, May, 1851 • Various
... time when all men are exclusively haunted by the thoughts of luxury and lucre, the soul appears extraordinary when divested of its bark, as the candid and naked soul of this good monk. He is eighty years old and more, and he has led from his youth up the restricted life of the Trappists; he probably does not know in what time he lives, ...
— En Route • J.-K. (Joris-Karl) Huysmans
... Musulmanes, qui, au lieu de se conformer aux dispositions souveraines et a l'esprit de la legislation et du centre, gardiennes de la foi juree, et favorables a une tolerance conforme aux principes du Coran et a un Gouvernement eclaire, se sont laissees egarer par un esprit de lucre et ...
— Notes on the Diplomatic History of the Jewish Question • Lucien Wolf
... worker in marbles whose file eats slowly into a block of porphyry? Would you seek to know the utmost power of language, or the strongest pressure that a phrase can bring to bear against rebellious lucre, against the miserly proprietor squatting in the recesses of his country lair?—listen to one of these great ambassadors of Parisian industry as he revolves and works and sucks like an intelligent piston of the ...
— The Illustrious Gaudissart • Honore de Balzac
... would be impatient, burdened with so much of the filthy lucre as Mark has. But not he. He is doing his little best ...
— The Campfire Girls of Roselawn - A Strange Message from the Air • Margaret Penrose
... Fop, as well pleas'd to think he shou'd put a Trick on his Mistress as he shou'd enioy her, which for the Lucre of the Fifty Guinea's he no longer question'd. And coming to the Goldsmith's Shop, he pulls his Ring off of his Finger, and asks him what he'll give him for't: The Goldsmith having look'd upon it, told him he'd give him Seventy Guineas for it. It cost me more ...
— The London-Bawd: With Her Character and Life - Discovering the Various and Subtle Intrigues of Lewd Women • Anonymous
... mercenary men," Dolf went on, "searchin' fur de filty lucre; I'se glad I neber was one ob dem. I allers has 'spised de dross; gib me lobe, I says, and peace wid de fair one ob my choice, ...
— A Noble Woman • Ann S. Stephens
... done, such thoughts as these were madness—perhaps she might marry another, no, he clinched his fist and vowed she should not. How had his so called revenge recoiled upon himself, he had not been aware how madly he loved her, until she was lost to him forever, and he almost cursed the filthy lucre that had lured him on until it had been his ruin. For what had he gained—he new what he had lost, the only woman that he had ever loved or could love, but what had he gained, not the satisfaction which he had expected, only a few thousand ...
— Isabel Leicester - A Romance • Clotilda Jennings
... actions are not performed for pay.'"—"That's very right; I like to see pride."—"Sire, I am not proud, but I have a soul; and if I thought that your Majesty could believe that I embraced your Majesty's cause for the sake of filthy lucre, I should request your Majesty to cease to rely on my services."—"If I had believed that to be the case, I should not have trusted you. No person ever received a more honourable and splendid proof of my ...
— Memoirs of the Private Life, Return, and Reign of Napoleon in 1815, Vol. I • Pierre Antoine Edouard Fleury de Chaboulon
... turned his thoughts to lucre's thirst, And stored until his garners burst: The spectre haunted him the more. Then poverty besieged his door: He feared the burglar and the thief; Nor light ...
— Fables of John Gay - (Somewhat Altered) • John Gay
... congenial. Real cases of demoniacal possession might, perhaps, be met with, and though scarcely amenable to the exorcisms of a clergy so corrupt as that of France in that day, they would yet justify a belief in the reality of those cases got up for the sake of filthy lucre, personal ambition, or private revenge. If the public mind was prepared for a belief in such cases, there were not wanting men to turn it to profitable account; and the quiet student who believed the efficacy of the means ...
— The Phantom World - or, The philosophy of spirits, apparitions, &c, &c. • Augustin Calmet
... frequent and annoying among the Nestorians. "Of the four thousand vagabonds," writes Dr. Perkins, "from the less than forty thousand Nestorians of Oroomiah, who made want their pretext for scattering themselves over Russia and other parts of Europe, as common beggars, hardly less greedy for lucre and for vice, than are locusts for every green thing, only a moiety return; many dying in those distant regions, from diseases induced by strange climates, or oftener by criminal indulgence; and many who survive, lying ...
— History Of The Missions Of The American Board Of Commissioners For Foreign Missions To The Oriental Churches, Volume II. • Rufus Anderson
... this enchanted helmet, by some strange accident must have fallen into the possession of one who, ignorant of its true value as a helmet and seeing it to be of the purest gold, hath inconsiderately melted down the one-half for lucre's sake, and of the other half made this, which, as thou sayest, doth indeed look like a barber's basin; but to me, who know what it really is, its transformation is of no importance, for I will have it so repaired in the first town where there is ...
— Wit and Wisdom of Don Quixote • Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra
... such the task. England is looking to her schools as she never did before. The aim of her education must be both high and wide, higher than lucre, wider than the nation. And the aim of our education cannot be fulfilled until the education of other peoples is infused with the same spirit. Education, like finance, must be planned on international ...
— Cambridge Essays on Education • Various
... gaze upon the rivers, The brooks of honey and milk; He must restore the gain and shall not swallow it, His lucre shall be as ...
— The Sceptics of the Old Testament: Job - Koheleth - Agur • Emile Joseph Dillon
... I would have managed in two minutes, had you not called me off the chase of yon cut-throat vagabond. But his grace knows the word of a Varangian, and I can assure him that either lucre of my silver gaberdine, which they nickname a cuirass, or the hatred of my corps, would be sufficient to incite any of these knaves to cut the throat of a Varangian, who appeared to be asleep.—So we go, I suppose, captain, to bear evidence before the ...
— Waverley Volume XII • Sir Walter Scott
... the pulse of his heart, the beat of his brain, the flash of his eye, the tremor of his masterful hands—all these now worked in fullest harmony and told her here was a man. Preciosa, never inclined to make too much of worldly considerations, now set them aside altogether. Any idea of mere lucre slipped from her mind, and if she thought at all of a mother's strained social ambitions for a favourite child, it was but to feel with a wilful joy that she was extricating herself from the selfish grasp of Virgilia Jeffreys. Her own humble and obscure ...
— Under the Skylights • Henry Blake Fuller
... the expence of the two systems, as they now stand in each of the countries; but it may first be proper to observe, that government in America is what it ought to be, a matter of honour and trust, and not made a trade of for the purpose of lucre. ...
— The Writings Of Thomas Paine, Complete - With Index to Volumes I - IV • Thomas Paine
... reader is acquainted. All this was perfectly clear to Squercum, who thought that he saw before him a most attractive course of proceeding against the Great Financier. It was pure ambition rather than any hope of lucre that urged him on. He regarded Melmotte as a grand swindler,—perhaps the grandest that the world had ever known,—and he could conceive no greater honour than the detection, successful prosecution, and ultimate destroying of so great a man. To have hunted ...
— The Way We Live Now • Anthony Trollope
... be borne away, and she be left desolate! Tearing my pictures from the walls, and ransacking every nook and corner, and packing up and carting away what's dearer to her than household gods, and all for filthy lucre's sake! No; let her enjoy the few years that will be spared to her; when she walks about the house let her feel it all her own, such as it be, and nothing missing but her brother. I'd rather my bones were torn ...
— Art in England - Notes and Studies • Dutton Cook
... camels than the Shaytan tempted me with greed of gain so that I said to myself, "The Darwaysh is alone in the world, without friends or kinsman, and is wholly estranged from matters mundane. What will these camel-loads of filthy lucre advantage him? Moreover, engrossed by the care of the camels, not to speak of the deceitfulness of riches, he may neglect his prayer and worship: therefore it behoveth me to take back from him some few of my beasts." With this resolve I made the camels halt and tying ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton
... means of marking their disapprobation of John of Gaunt and his policy; but do not plunder it, so as to prove they are fighting for an idea: "So that the whole nation should know they did nothing for the love of lucre, death was decreed against any one who should dare to appropriate anything found in the palace. The innumerable gold and silver objects there would be chopped up in small pieces with a hatchet, and the pieces thrown into the Thames or the sewers; ...
— A Literary History of the English People - From the Origins to the Renaissance • Jean Jules Jusserand
... impassioned invectives poured out upon Sir John Macdonald by his political opponents of that day in connection with the Pacific Scandal. According to them he had basely betrayed his country, selling her honour for filthy lucre; he had shamefully prostituted his office; he was a great criminal for whose punishment justice cried aloud, and much more to the same effect. Yet every one who dispassionately considers the affair to-day in its true perspective sees quite plainly that, ...
— The Day of Sir John Macdonald - A Chronicle of the First Prime Minister of the Dominion • Joseph Pope
... called her schismatical and heretical, and had offered to cooperate strenuously with her deadliest enemies in their designs against her. The highest praise to which he was entitled was this, that he had shrunk from the exceeding wickedness and baseness of publicly abjuring, for lucre, the religion in which he had been brought up, which he believed to be true, and of which he had long made an ostentatious profession. Yet he was extolled by the great body of Churchmen as if he had been the bravest and purest of martyrs. The Old and New Testaments, ...
— The History of England from the Accession of James II. - Volume 2 (of 5) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... all our world's mass, that only searchest and fathomest the bottom of all hearts' conceits, and in them seest the true original of all actions intended, how no malice, revenge, nor quittance of injury, nor desire of bloodshed, nor greediness of lucre, hath bred the resolution of our now set-out army, but a heedful care and wary watch that no neglect of foes nor over-surety of harm might breed either danger to us or glory to them. Thou that didst inspire the mind, we humbly beseech ...
— The Golden Grasshopper - A story of the days of Sir Thomas Gresham • W.H.G. Kingston
... more beautiful. He was equally rich in mind and heart. The fairest traits of a character sketched by Paul, found in him perfect illustration. For he was 'blameless, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, apt to teach, not given to filthy lucre.' He had not a trace of worldly ambition; he declared his duty to his Sovereign by going to the levee once a year, but beyond this he never sought contact with the great. The life of his spirit and of his intellect was so full, that ...
— Faraday As A Discoverer • John Tyndall
... merchant, the manufacturer, the banker, the broker, the speculator, the selfish politician, when compared with those confided to the Christian wife and mother? They are too often simply contemptible—a wretched, feverish, maddening struggle to pile up lucre, which is any thing but clean. Where is the superior merit of such a life, that we should hanker after it, when placed beside that of the loving, unselfish, Christian wife and mother—the wife, standing at her husband's side, to cheer, to aid, to strengthen, to console, to ...
— Female Suffrage • Susan Fenimore Cooper
... agane the fals doctouris of heresyes, with the sword of the Spreat, which is the word of God; and not only to wyne agane, bot also to owircum:—as saith[396] Paule, 'A bischope most be faltles, as becumith the minister of God, not stubburne, not angrie, no drunkard, no feghtar, not gevin to filthy lucre; but harberous, one that loveth goodnes, sober mynded, rychteous, holy, temperat, and such as cleaveth unto the trew word of the doctrine, that he may be able to exhorte with holsome learning, and to improve that which thei say against him.'" The Fourte parte of his sermon ...
— The Works of John Knox, Vol. 1 (of 6) • John Knox
... thousand people fled from their homes to pestilential jungles, preferring famine, and fever, and the haunts of tigers, to the tyranny of him to whom an English and a Christian government had, for shameful lucre, sold their substance, and their blood, and the honor of their wives and daughters. Colonel Champion remonstrated with the Nabob Vizier, and sent strong representations to Fort William; but the Governor had made no conditions as to the mode in which the war was to be carried on. He ...
— Critical and Historical Essays, Volume III (of 3) • Thomas Babington Macaulay
... Africa than the grossest abuse yet written. Its tactic is to set black against white, to pander for the public love of scandal, and systematically to abuse all the employes of Government. And the sole object of this vile politic, loudly proclaimed to be philanthropic and negrophile, has been low lucre—in fact, an attempt to butter ...
— To the Gold Coast for Gold - A Personal Narrative in Two Volumes.—Vol. I • Richard F. Burton
... a notable Undertaker in Latin Verse, and had well deserved of his Country, had not lucre of Gain and private Ambition over-swayed his Pen, to favour successful Rebellion. He wrote in Latin his Marston-Moor; A Gratulatory Ode of Peace; Englished afterwards by Thomas Manley, and other Latin pieces, besides English ones, not a few, which (as we said) might have been meriting, ...
— The Lives of the Most Famous English Poets (1687) • William Winstanley
... worshipper, nor fashion's fool, Not Lucre's madman, nor Ambition's tool, Not proud, nor servile;—be one Poet's praise, That, if he pleas'd, he pleas'd by manly ways: 335 That Flatt'ry, ev'n to Kings, he held a shame, And thought a Lie in verse or prose the same. That not in Fancy's maze he wander'd ...
— The Rape of the Lock and Other Poems • Alexander Pope
... but they were essentially fair-weather men. The casual courier may be alert, loyal, and trustworthy; he may be relied on to try his honest best, but it is not to be expected of him that he will greatly dare and count his life but as dross when his incentive to enterprise is merely filthy lucre. But I could trust Andreas to dare and to endure—to overcome obstacles, and, if man could, to "get there," where, in the base-quarters in Bucharest, the amanuenses were waiting to copy out in round hand for the foreign telegraphist the rapid script of the correspondent scribbling ...
— The Idler, Volume III., Issue XIII., February 1893 - An Illustrated Monthly. Edited By Jerome K. Jerome & Robert Barr • Various
... no the loss o' warl's gear [worldly lucre] That could sae bitter draw the tear, Or mak our bardie, dowie, wear [downcast] The mourning weed: He's lost a friend and ...
— Robert Burns - How To Know Him • William Allan Neilson
... sordid wife-seekers, or, rather, money-seekers; for it is not a wife that they seek, but only filthy lucre! They violate all their other faculties simply to gratify miserly desire. Verily such "have ...
— Searchlights on Health: Light on Dark Corners • B.G. Jefferis
... fond of lucre,' said the man in black; 'but does not grudge a faithful priest a little private perquisite,' and he took out a ...
— The Romany Rye - A Sequel to 'Lavengro' • George Borrow
... had I chosen some other profession Than that of moulding the human mind, I might have secured a greater possession Of lucre and treasures and powers combined, Than all I may now of these truly own; But I have in my casket some jewels I treasure Far more than all stocks and houses and lands, In gold and silver their worth has no measure, For none may compute warm hearts and true hands, When the shadows ...
— Our Profession and Other Poems • Jared Barhite
... and those on public grounds. The last are the only ones which the elector would like to avow. The best side of their character is that which people are anxious to show, even to those who are no better than themselves. People will give dishonest or mean votes from lucre, from malice, from pique, from personal rivalry, even from the interests or prejudices of class or sect, more readily in secret than in public. And cases exist—they may come to be more frequent—in which almost the only restraint upon a majority ...
— Considerations on Representative Government • John Stuart Mill
... ought to end, and reason, as well as enlightened policy, demand that in this respect our legislation should be reformed, in order that the mace of justice, instead of being prostituted in search of lucre, may henceforwards be wholly employed in the support of equity ...
— The Former Philippines thru Foreign Eyes • Fedor Jagor; Tomas de Comyn; Chas. Wilkes; Rudolf Virchow.
... Mrs. Deford isn't merely that she is an— exaggerater, let us say, but she's such a lover of lucre, clean or not. She can smell money on the way, and the chance of any one's getting it is sufficient cause for her cultivation of friendship. You don't want to know her. It's better to be polite to her, ...
— Miss Gibbie Gault • Kate Langley Bosher
... stock-jobbing. This knowledge produced a connexion between him and the money-corporations, which served to enhance his importance. He perceived the bulk of mankind were actuated by a sordid thirst of lucre; he had sagacity enough to convert the degeneracy of the times to his own advantage; and on this, and this alone, he founded the whole superstructure of his subsequent administration. In the late reign he had by dint of speaking decisively to every question, by boldly impeaching ...
— The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.II. - From William and Mary to George II. • Tobias Smollett
... no anger at criticism, no villain fancies disturbed his soul. No laziness, no feebleness in effort, injured his work, no desire for money, no faltering of aspiration, no pandering of his gift and genius to please the world, no surrender of art for the sake of fame or filthy lucre, no falseness to his ideal, no base pessimism, no slavery to science yet no boastful ignorance of its good, no morbid naturalism, no devotion to the false forms of beauty, no despair of man, no retreat from men into a world of sickly or vain beauty, no abandonment ...
— The Poetry Of Robert Browning • Stopford A. Brooke
... purpose of aggression by private merchants, and merely for the sake of profit. They are not fitted out with any patriotic motives, but merely for gain. They are speculations in which the lives of people on both sides are sacrificed for the sake of lucre—and had you witnessed such scenes of bloodshed and cruelty as I have during my career, such dreadful passions let loose, and defying all restraint, you would agree with me, that he who leads such miscreants to their quarry has much to answer ...
— The Privateer's-Man - One hundred Years Ago • Frederick Marryat
... prefers cadet society, and I always did like boys," explained Mrs. Garrison. Some rather gay old boys used to run up Saturday afternoons on the Mary Powell and spend Sunday at the Point—Wall Street men of fifty years and much lucre. "Dear old friends of father's," Mrs. Frank used to say, "and I've simply got to entertain them." Entertained they certainly were, for her wit and vivacity were acknowledged on every side, and entertained not only collectively, but severally, for she always managed ...
— Found in the Philippines - The Story of a Woman's Letters • Charles King
... will not swagger nor boast Of his country's meeds, in a tone Missuiting a great man most If such should speak of his own; Nor will he act, on her side, From motives baser, indeed, Than a man of a noble pride Can avow for himself at need; Never, for lucre or laurels, Or custom, though such should be rife, Adapting the smaller morals To measure the larger life. He, though the merchants persuade, And the soldiers are eager for strife, Finds not his country in quarrels Only to find her in trade,— While still he accords her such honour As ...
— The Poetical Works of Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Volume IV • Elizabeth Barrett Browning
... not have me back in the Settlements, to scandalize them that is of my faith? No, friend; my lot is cast in the woods, and thee must not ask me again to leave them. And, friend, thee must not think I have served thee for the lucre of money or gain; for truly these things are now to me as nothing. The meat that feeds me, the skins that cover, the leaves that make my bed, are all in the forest around me, to be mine when I want them; and what more can I desire? Yet, friend, if thee thinks theeself ...
— Choice Specimens of American Literature, And Literary Reader - Being Selections from the Chief American Writers • Benj. N. Martin
... friend," he at length said aloud, on perceiving that the old gentleman had fairly exhausted himself and was lying panting on his back, "you are indeed a lamentable instance of the lengths to which the greedy lust of lucre will carry our poor human nature. It is really distressing to see Marguerite, a faithful, attached servant, suddenly converted into a tormenting harpy by the prospect of a legacy! Lawyers and priests flock around you like birds ...
— The International Weekly Miscellany, Volume I. No. 8 - Of Literature, Art, and Science, August 19, 1850 • Various
... shall die." The crone promised her that she would do her best to bring her to her desire; so she veiled herself and repairing to the young man, saluted him with the salam and acquainted him with the girl's case, saying, "Her master is a greedy wight; so do thou invite him and lure him with lucre, and he will sell thee the hand-maiden." Accordingly, he made a banquet, and standing in the man's way, invited him[FN299] and brought him to his house, where they sat down and ate and drank and abode in talk. Presently, the young man said ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 1 • Richard F. Burton
... whose prospect he regarded as the only motive of those abandonments which had left the Whig party suddenly so feeble. "Is this a time," exclaimed the orator, "for selfish intrigues and the little traffic of lucre? Is it intended to confirm the pernicious doctrine, that all public men are impostors, and that every politician has his price? Nay, even for those who have no direct object, what is the language which their actions speak? 'The throne ...
— Blackwoods Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 366, April, 1846 • Various
... combine To yield thy muse just half-a-crown per line? [24] No! when the sons of song descend to trade, Their bays are sear, their former laurels fade, Let such forego the poet's sacred name, Who rack their brains for lucre, not for fame: Still for stern Mammon may they toil in vain! [25] And sadly gaze on Gold they cannot gain! 180 Such be their meed, such still the just reward [xv] Of prostituted Muse and hireling bard! For this we spurn Apollo's venal son, And ...
— Byron's Poetical Works, Vol. 1 • Byron
... application. He careered over the whole annals of the world, and collected every instance in which genius had degraded itself at the footstool of power, or principle had been sacrificed for the vanity or the lucre of place; but still there was no allusion to Canning, and no connection that ordinary men could discover with the business before the House. When however, he had collected every material which suited his purpose,—when the mass had become big and black, he bound it about and ...
— The American Union Speaker • John D. Philbrick
... found Lucre'tia, the wife of Collati'nus, not like the other women of her age, spending the time in ease and luxury, but spinning in the midst of her maids, and cheerfully portioning out their tasks. Her modest ...
— Pinnock's Improved Edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome • Oliver Goldsmith
... eloquence—it mounted higher Than Attic purity or Roman fire: Adore his services-our lions view Ranging, where Roman eagles never flew: Copy his soul supreme o'er Lucre's sphere; —But oh! beware three ...
— The Letters of Horace Walpole Volume 3 • Horace Walpole
... Danaes now a dayes, That love for lucre, paine for gaine is sold; No true affection can their fancie please, Except it be a Jove, to raine downe gold Into their laps, which they wyde open hold: If legem pone comes, he is receav'd, When Vix haud habeo ...
— The Affectionate Shepherd • Richard Barnfield
... That was what HE looked to. The church. Not the chapel, Lord. The church. No rectors, no vicars, no archdeacons, no bishops, no archbishops, in the chapel, but, O Lord! many such in the church. Protect our sinful brother from his love of lucre. Cleanse from our unawakened brother's breast his sin of worldly- mindedness. The prayer said infinitely more in words, but nothing more to ...
— George Silverman's Explanation • Charles Dickens
... I gave that Name, did not. I agree with him, that a Man's Salvation is the greatest Benefit he can receive or wish for; and I am persuaded, that, speaking of Things Spiritual, the Word is very proper in that Sense; the same may be said of the Words Profit, Gain, and, if you please, Lucre; but I deny, that without any Addition, this is the common Acceptation of them; in which, I hope, I may have the Liberty to make use of Words with the Rest of my Fellow-Subjects. All temporal Privileges and worldly Advantages whatever, are call'd Benefits, and a Thousand Things are beneficial to ...
— A Letter to Dion • Bernard Mandeville |
