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Desire   Listen
verb
Desire  v. t.  (past & past part. desired; pres. part. desiring)  
1.
To long for; to wish for earnestly; to covet. "Neither shall any man desire thy land." "Ye desire your child to live."
2.
To express a wish for; to entreat; to request. "Then she said, Did I desire a son of my lord?" "Desire him to go in; trouble him no more."
3.
To require; to demand; to claim. (Obs.) "A doleful case desires a doleful song."
4.
To miss; to regret. (Obs.) "She shall be pleasant while she lives, and desired when she dies."
Synonyms: To long for; hanker after; covet; wish; ask; request; solicit; entreat; beg. To Desire, Wish. In desire the feeling is usually more eager than in wish. "I wish you to do this" is a milder form of command than "I desire you to do this," though the feeling prompting the injunction may be the same.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Desire" Quotes from Famous Books



... all, was, when some of the Grandees made a grave Address to the Queen of the Country, to desire the Northern Men to settle Matters first, and to tell them, that when that was done, they should see what these would do for them. This was a home Stroke, if it had but hit, and the Misfortune only lay in this, That the Northern Men were not Fools enough; the clearness of the Air in those cold ...
— The Consolidator • Daniel Defoe

... of Unami's brother, and many of those most clamorous against the white trapper, being actuated by the earnest desire of returning home with their vow accomplished, when they would be received into the list of warriors, and have wives and other honours, were unanimous in agreeing to the ...
— The Old Santa Fe Trail - The Story of a Great Highway • Henry Inman

... to perform either well is beyond the capacity of most humans, and I desire not to be blessed above my betters. Then let my rash deeds and my prudent words both be teachers unto thee. But if it be true that no woman is responsible for your grave countenance this morning, then am I wasting words, and will return to ...
— What Answer? • Anna E. Dickinson

... rehearsed by the early converted natives, naturally misled historians to adopt the notion that these divine culture heroes were "Toltecs," and even in the modern writings of the Abbe Brasseur (de Bourbourg), of M. Desire Charnay, and others, this unreal people continue to be set forth as ...
— The Annals of the Cakchiquels • Daniel G. Brinton

... the misfortune," Alexey Alexandrovitch began, "to have been deceived in my married life, and I desire to break off all relations with my wife by legal means—that is, to be divorced, but to do this so that my son may not ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy

... the luck to encounter a company of my destined command, marched in to be mustered into the United States service. They were without arms, and all looked as thoroughly black as the most faithful philanthropist could desire; there did not seem to be so much as a mulatto among them. Their coloring suited me, all but the legs, which were clad in a lively scarlet, as intolerable to my eyes as if I had been a turkey. I saw them mustered; General Saxton talked to them a little, in his direct, manly way; they gave ...
— The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 14, No. 85, November, 1864 • Various

... purveying, seemed arguslike in their critical surveillance. He would have abolished them had he not felt that the boy would understand the change. If the boy had only forgotten to copy letters or had manifested an unruly desire to attend his relatives' funerals, his employer would have been a happier man. As it was, he felt apologetic every time he came in ...
— The Short Line War • Merwin-Webster

... flowed on monotonously and slowly somewhere down the muddy, turbid stream, year after year; and it was all bound up in strong ancient customs and habits that led them to do one and the same thing day in and day out. None of them, it seemed, had either the time or the desire to attempt to change this state ...
— Mother • Maxim Gorky

... end on the whole satisfactorily. Irene was by no means perfect; even Agnes showed signs of being spoiled owing to the new regime. Hughie expressed a strong desire to be back at school. Miss Frost never ceased to watch the two, and the struggle within her breast did not die out. Lady Jane alone was thankful for the marked improvement in her child. Not that she saw very much of Irene, for Irene and Agnes ...
— A Modern Tomboy - A Story for Girls • L. T. Meade

... daily task, not concerned that their state or nation should extend its boundaries, least of all that it should provoke attack; little conscious of the historic debt of nations to one another, but wishing well to others except when they cross the path of a personal desire; gaining rapidly more sense of actual community among living men, but hardly realizing yet how man's power has been built up in the past and how infinitely it might be advanced and the world improved by harmony and steadily directed efforts in the ...
— The Unity of Civilization • Various

... known standard of English composition. But the meaning is in all cases clearly conveyed, and, in justice both to the author and the reader, they have been printed verbatim et literatim, as in the original manuscripts. We desire to place upon record our high appreciation of the courtesy extended to the Editor of this volume by the governors of the Bodleian Library and of the British Museum, in allowing him to copy the original manuscripts in their possession. ...
— Voyages of Peter Esprit Radisson • Peter Esprit Radisson

... my father's side the matter is more complex. The history of the family has been traced at the desire of my eldest brother and my own, by Sir William Fraser, the highest living authority.[2] He has carried us up to a rather remote period, I think before Elizabeth, but has not yet been able to connect us with the earliest known ...
— The Life of William Ewart Gladstone, Vol. 1 (of 3) - 1809-1859 • John Morley

... of Union according to Dimensions, Force of Desire, and Time; and on the different kinds ...
— The Kama Sutra of Vatsyayana - Translated From The Sanscrit In Seven Parts With Preface, - Introduction and Concluding Remarks • Vatsyayana

... I knew. If you desire it, I will persuade your uncle to tell you. You keep talking about a will. What do ...
— Seek and Find - or The Adventures of a Smart Boy • Oliver Optic

... host, Mr. Hackley, that he should withdraw into the house for a "leetle rest-up," he returned a laughing refusal. For this was his last appearance in Hunston, as well as his first in recent days, and very strongly did he desire to make it testify to his warm interest in the town's great day and the personal triumph ...
— Captivating Mary Carstairs • Henry Sydnor Harrison

... could give her a carriage and a pair of horses!" But of course it was ridiculous to think of things like that. He could not buy a carriage for Elizabeth out of her own money— besides, her money was shrinking alarmingly. It was this passionate desire to propitiate her, as well as the recognition of approaching necessities, that brought him to the point where he saw capitulation ahead of him. "I wish I could make up my mind," he thought, wearily. "Well, if I don't get something to do pretty soon, it will ...
— The Iron Woman • Margaret Deland

... Mounchensey—for your dispute with Sir Francis Mitchell has acquainted me with your name," John Wolfe said—"that your rashness has placed you in imminent peril; so that there is but little chance for the present of my showing you the hospitality and kindness I desire. Sir Giles seems to hover over you as a rapacious vulture might do before making his swoop. Heaven shield you from his talons! And now, my good young Sir, accept one piece of caution from me, which my years and kindly feelings towards you entitle me to make. An you 'scape this danger, ...
— The Star-Chamber, Volume 1 - An Historical Romance • W. Harrison Ainsworth

... this, from very excess of feeling one no longer thinks, or if one thinks, it is distractedly. One only longs for some end or other. The death of others instills in you so much horror that your own death becomes an object of desire; that is to say, if by dying, you would be in some degree useful! One calls to mind deaths which have put an end to angers and to revolts. One only retains this ambition, to be ...
— The History of a Crime - The Testimony of an Eye-Witness • Victor Hugo

... has experienced the most terrible vicissitudes, but, vanquished or victorious, triumphant or abased, never has she lost her peculiar gift of attracting the curiosity of the world. She interests every living being, and even those who do not love her desire to know her. To this peculiar attraction which radiates from her, artists and men of letters can well bear witness, since it is to literature and to the arts, before all, that France owes such ...
— Serge Panine, Complete • Georges Ohnet

... plenty of paper and pens and ink with me now, wherever I go, so that when the desire for work comes to me I need not ...
— Diary of a Pilgrimage • Jerome K. Jerome

... of England or France or Germany or Italy, or any other country, desire to ascertain the number and character of the inventions patented to the citizens of their respective countries, it would require but a few hours of work to get exact statistics on the subject, but not so with the colored inventor. Here, ...
— The Colored Inventor - A Record of Fifty Years • Henry E. Baker

... (but we earnestly advise any woman to make sure he is cured before trusting her future to him). Ambition—which includes every form of vanity and self-delusion—will cure a drunkard, and has cured many thousands. Even the miser's passion of economy may outweigh love of drink and cure the lesser desire. —— ...
— Editorials from the Hearst Newspapers • Arthur Brisbane

... half angel and half bird And all a wonder and a wild desire— Boldest of hearts that ever braved the sun, Took sanctuary within the holier blue And sang a kindred soul out to his face— Hail then, and hearken from the realms of help! Never may I commence my song, ...
— Modern English Books of Power • George Hamlin Fitch

... also was filled with a desire to get to San Salvatore first and pick out the room or rooms she preferred, and she and Lady Caroline had after all traveled together. As early as Calais they began to suspect it; in Paris they feared it; at Modane they knew it; at Mezzago they concealed ...
— The Enchanted April • Elizabeth von Arnim

... all apt to set too high a value on what we ourselves have done; and I may do this; but I do firmly believe, that to cure any young woman of this fatal sublimation, she has only patiently to read my COTTAGE ECONOMY, written with an anxious desire to promote domestic skill and ability in that sex, on whom so much of the happiness of man must always depend. A lady in Worcestershire told me, that until she read COTTAGE ECONOMY she had never baked in the house, and ...
— Advice to Young Men • William Cobbett

... him a right faire and large gelding richly trapped, together with a footcloth of Orient crimson veluet, enriched with gold laces, all furnished in most glorious fashion, of the present, and gift of the sayde merchants: where vpon the Ambassadour at instant desire mounted, riding on the way towards Smithfield barres, the first limites of the liberties of the Citie of London. The Lord Maior accompanied with all the Aldermen in their skarlet did receiue him, and so riding through the Citie of London in the middle, betweene the Lord Maior and Viscount Montague, ...
— The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, • Richard Hakluyt

... a strong desire to whoop; the spirit of the lad was so manifest; his earnestness so marked. But, as calmly as possible, he said, "Don't worry on that score, William, a rest will do you good. Besides, if you go where Mr. Whimple wants you ...
— William Adolphus Turnpike • William Banks

... but Petruchio merrily said, he would lay as much as that upon his hawk or hound, but twenty times as much upon his wife. Lucentio and Hortensio raised the wager to a hundred crowns, and Lucentio first sent his servant to desire Bianca would come to him. But the servant returned, and said, "Sir, my mistress sends you word she is busy and cannot come."—"How," said Petruchio, "does she say she is busy and cannot come? Is that an answer for a wife?" Then they laughed at him, and said, it would be well if Katharine ...
— Tales from Shakespeare • Charles Lamb and Mary Lamb

... may becomingly be carried in reply, is another and a delicate question. There is almost necessarily something distasteful to us not only in self-praise but even in a thorough self-appreciation. We desire of the ideal character that his faculties of admiration should be, as it were, absorbed in an eager perception of the merits of others,—that a kind of shrinking delicacy should prevent him from appraising his own achievements ...
— Wordsworth • F. W. H. Myers

... accorded in ignorance of Charlotte's pecuniary advantages? The young man looked very pale as he went to smoke his cigar in Mr. Sheldon's garden. Charlotte followed him with anxious eyes, and wondered at the sudden gravity of his manner. George Sheldon also was puzzled by his brother's desire for ...
— Birds of Prey • M. E. Braddon

... "Here are three rules which should guide you through life, and if you observe them you will find your path made easier: Do not cry over spilt milk; do not desire what is unattainable, and do not ...
— Children's Literature - A Textbook of Sources for Teachers and Teacher-Training Classes • Charles Madison Curry

... and shook her head; if a man killed himself, she did not desire that her gracious name should be entangled with ...
— Under Two Flags • Ouida [Louise de la Ramee]

... appear to have been dictated by feelings and modes of thought which, under our present mental conditions, we are unable to comprehend. A new era begins, however, with the Codes. Wherever, after this epoch, we trace the course of legal modification we are able to attribute it to the conscious desire of improvement, or at all events of compassing objects other than those which were aimed at in ...
— Ancient Law - Its Connection to the History of Early Society • Sir Henry James Sumner Maine

... wish of a Paris reputation, and, indeed, was in a state of internal revolt against the artistic life which I found there. At our meeting he struck me as the most perfect contrast to my own being and situation. In this world into which it had been my desire to fly from my narrow circumstances, Liszt had grown up from his earliest age so as to be the object of general love and admiration at a time when I was repulsed by general coldness and want of sympathy. In consequence, I looked ...
— Great Violinists And Pianists • George T. Ferris

... We were both in the councils of our Sovereign together, and I had long the honour to enjoy his private friendship. In all the course of my acquaintance with him I never knew a man in whose truth and justice I had greater confidence, or in whom I saw a more invariable desire to promote the public service. In the whole course of my communication with him, I never knew an instance in which he did not show the strongest attachment to truth; and I never saw in the whole course of my life the smallest reason for suspecting that he stated anything ...
— Self Help • Samuel Smiles

... "I desire no man's regard, Mr. Rashleigh, on such terms as must sink me in my own; and I think these injurious suspicions will afford a very good reason for quitting Osbaldistone Hall, which I shall do whenever I can communicate on the ...
— Rob Roy, Complete, Illustrated • Sir Walter Scott

... life and fate, for his subtle and delicate psychology, and for that philosophic passion in which all the other motives and springs of life were becoming included, was a task incapable of perfect solution. On his death-bed Virgil made it his last desire that the Aeneid should be destroyed, nominally on the ground that it still wanted three years' work to bring it to perfection, but one can hardly doubt from a deeper and less articulate feeling. The ...
— Latin Literature • J. W. Mackail

... Aimee. She was enchantment and delight. She was appeal and tenderness. She was blind longing and mystery. She was beauty and desire.... ...
— The Fortieth Door • Mary Hastings Bradley

... Susan. Virginia stood by the little window of the cabin, and as the Barbara paddled and floated down the river she looked anxiously for signals of a conflagration. Nay, in that hour she wished that the city might burn. So it is that the best of us may at times desire misery to thousands that our own malice may be fed. Virginia longed to see the yellow flame creep along the wet, gray clouds. Passionate tears came to her eyes at the thought of the humiliation she had suffered,—and before him, of all men. Could she ever live with her aunt ...
— The Crossing • Winston Churchill

... look impossible on the one side; and on the other—there was her Christian name and promise. Of course it was wrong for Christians to go!—she knew that. Yet for the time, nothing seemed tangible or real but this; go she must! And so from week to week this fever of desire grew and increased, fed from time to time by those snatches of song that floated through the great hall of ...
— Tired Church Members • Anne Warner

... favor of the free school system is, that it is a benefit to all to be surrounded by an intelligent and moral community, and for such a benefit every property holder should be glad to contribute his quota. Is there, then, any need of asking the question, if the people of these counties desire the sort of population that comes to them ...
— Cotton is King and The Pro-Slavery Arguments • Various

... thoroughly substantial dinner was served to them, followed by tea at six in the evening, at both of which meals the pirate captain did the honours with a manifest desire to evince a friendly disposition toward his guests, and about nine p.m. a quiet and unobtrusive removal from the cabin to their new quarters in the after- hold was effected; after which most of the party disposed themselves comfortably upon the bedding which they found had been provided ...
— The Pirate Island - A Story of the South Pacific • Harry Collingwood

... Republics of Italy seemed possible. That country is Italy. That shows that between the action of Italy there is not, nor can there be, contrast, and indeed that between the two nations there is complete agreement in European continental policy. It is the common desire of the two nations, though perhaps for different reasons, that no one State shall have hegemony on the continent. But between the years 1688 and 1815 Great Britain and France were at war for seventy years: for seventy years, that is, out of a hundred and ...
— Peaceless Europe • Francesco Saverio Nitti

... thinking of Maria all day. She was the woman whom Doctor McCall loved. By the time night came Kitty had a maddening desire to see again this woman that he loved—to touch her, hear her speak. She had been used to regard her as a disagreeable bore, but now she looked on her as a woman set apart from all the world. She had made a poor excuse to come up to the Water-cure: now that she was there ...
— Lippincott's Magazine of Popular Literature and Science, Vol. XII, No. 28. July, 1873. • Various

... extraordinary fidelity and attachment — I insist upon your receiving this small token of my gratitude; but don't imagine that I look upon this as an adequate recompence for the service you have done me — I have determined to settle thirty pounds a-year upon you for life; and I desire these gentlemen will bear witness to this my intention, of which I have a memorandum in my pocketbook.' 'Lord make me thankful for all these mercies! (cried Clinker, sobbing), I have been a poor bankrupt from the beginning — your honour's goodness found me, ...
— The Expedition of Humphry Clinker • Tobias Smollett

... and America has flourished on individual effort called out by the prospect of individual gain. Every man acquired from his boyhood the idea that he must look after himself. Morally, physically and financially that was the recognised way of getting on. The desire to make a fortune was regarded as a laudable ambition, a proper stimulus to effort. The ugly word "profiteer" had not yet been coined. There was no income tax to turn a man's pockets inside out and take away his savings. The world was ...
— My Discovery of England • Stephen Leacock

... ravenous demon as she was, she would catch and understand it—an inarticulate message of gratitude. She rose erect on the spot my friend and I had lately quitted, and there was not, in all the long reach of her desire, an inch of her evil that fell short. This first vividness of vision and emotion were things of a few seconds, during which Mrs. Grose's dazed blink across to where I pointed struck me as a sovereign sign that ...
— The Turn of the Screw • Henry James

... told of the glorious and boundless conquests of the Prince, the which did exceedingly stir my soul—eager it was for gain above all things else. My age, my vigour, my skill are equal to any toil; above all, my passionate desire to see the world and explore the unknown set me all on ...
— A Book of Discovery - The History of the World's Exploration, From the Earliest - Times to the Finding of the South Pole • Margaret Bertha (M. B.) Synge

... than the Suez or Panama Canals and, to do it, they have put in a good fighting soldier, quite out of his setting, and merely because they did not know what to do with him in Egypt! In case Cowans shares K.'s suspicions about my sneaking desire for Ellison, I say, "I assure you; most solemnly I assure you, that the personal equation does not, even in the vaguest fashion, enter into my thoughts. Put the greatest enemy I possess in the world, and the person I most dislike, into that post, and I would thank God for ...
— Gallipoli Diary, Volume I • Ian Hamilton

... weary of life my heart is and so sore Afraid. What harp-playing Back from the land whose name is Never More My lost desire will bring? ...
— A Cluster of Grapes - A Book of Twentieth Century Poetry • Various

... exist; to understand it is the triumph of human intelligence; to desire to possess it is the most dangerous kind of madness.—Alfred ...
— Pearls of Thought • Maturin M. Ballou

... bargained with, or cheapened at least one half. The ladies commonly make their purchases late in the afternoon or evening, stopping in their victorias at the doors of the shops, from whence the articles they desire are brought by the shopmen and deftly displayed on the street. When lighted up at night the stores are really brilliant and attractive, presenting quite a holiday appearance; but customers are sadly wanting in these days of business depression. "I have ...
— Due South or Cuba Past and Present • Maturin M. Ballou

... wife, or some near relative of hers, as well as he, Captain Lake, could understand, and was resolved to go to London privately, and have the matter arranged there. He waited near the 'White House,' while he, Stanley Lake, went to Gylingden and got his tax-cart at his desire. He could give particulars as to that. Captain Lake overtook him, and he got in and was driven to Dollington, where he took the up-train. That some weeks afterwards he saw him at Brighton; and the night before last, by appointment, in the grounds of ...
— Wylder's Hand • J. Sheridan Le Fanu

... desire to stay; through her tears] No, no, I can't. [She shakes hands with him and quickly ...
— The Sea-Gull • Anton Checkov

... are exported annually to be eaten by the Catawampous Indians; on the death of Mr. Grubly, the retired cheesemonger, who endowed the weathercock; and in aid of the funds of the "newly-born-baby-clothes-bag-and-basket-institution:" printed at the desire of his, "he fears, in this instance, too partial" parishioners, and presented ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 1, September 18, 1841 • Various

... is quieter there are few who can resist the desire to plunge into the blue waters, for at seven o'clock the shore is so entirely deserted that one seems to be bathing from some primeval shore where no other forms of life may be expected than some giant crustaceans. This thought, perhaps, prompted ...
— Yorkshire—Coast & Moorland Scenes • Gordon Home

... Savona; it would be better to guard him at Grenoble, since he is there; the former course would have the appearance of making sport of the old man. I have not authorized Cardinal Fesch to send any one to his holiness; I have only had the minister of religion informed that I should desire Cardinal Maury and the other prelates to write to the Pope, to know what he wishes, and to make him understand that if he renounces the Concordat I shall regard it on my side as null and void. As to Cardinal Pacca, I suppose that ...
— Worlds Best Histories - France Vol 7 • M. Guizot and Madame Guizot De Witt

... no requirement of absolute conformity with the established church of England, yet on the ground of the desire to carry only true religion to the natives it was made the duty of the officials of the company to tender the oath of supremacy to every prospective colonist before he sailed, and thus to insure the Protestantism ...
— European Background Of American History - (Vol. I of The American Nation: A History) • Edward Potts Cheyney

... the age of twelve to fourteen years, to accomplish all that has been indicated above concerning the aims of history teaching. The most that can be done is to lay the foundation and give the pupil a desire to continue his reading after his school days are over. Serious blame rests on the teacher whose methods of teaching history, instead of attracting the child to the subject, give him a distaste for it. If history is made real and living to children, it is usually ...
— Ontario Teachers' Manuals: History • Ontario Ministry of Education

... take place. By his own desire his body was not being taken to Moorlands, the family seat in Gloucestershire, but was to be buried at Woking. The family chapel did not appeal to him. Indeed, he had never spent much of his time at Moorlands, preferring his yacht or the Continent ...
— The Master Detective - Being Some Further Investigations of Christopher Quarles • Percy James Brebner

... desire a slap from her hand. Tears fill my eyes, and I feel that she has humiliated me so deeply, that she doesn't even find it worth while to torture ...
— Venus in Furs • Leopold von Sacher-Masoch

... we have taken lodgings at No. 20 Alfred Place, Bedford Square, and we are quite contented. I have written to Moffett asking him whether we ought to locate the children in Paris or in Germany. You know that my means are very limited, and my desire to do the right thing is necessarily hampered. I met Colonel John C. Reid for the first time to-night [Mr. Reid was Mr. Bennett's manager]. He is in favor of Paris, but of course he does not understand how really d——d poor ...
— Eugene Field, A Study In Heredity And Contradictions - Vol. I • Slason Thompson

... been DOING it ever since. He had thought and planned and altered the details of the work repeatedly. The colours for the different parts had been selected and rejected and re-selected over and over again. A keen desire to do the work had grown within him, but he had scarcely allowed himself to hope that it would be done at all. His face flushed slightly as he took the ...
— The Ragged Trousered Philanthropists • Robert Tressell

... me against my parents, and bit my mother's ankles when she scolded me or seemed about to punish me, and come at once to Childebrand, a cat of the Romanticist period. The name suffices to let my reader understand the secret desire I felt to run counter to Boileau, whom I disliked then, but with whom I have since made my peace. It will be ...
— My Private Menagerie - from The Works of Theophile Gautier Volume 19 • Theophile Gautier

... a thing to be used much with safety: and he do find that this very gun was never yet shot off: I was mighty satisfied with it and him, and the sight of so much curiosity of this kind. Here he brought also a haberdasher at my desire, and I bought a hat of him, and so away and called away my wife from his house, and so home and to read, and then to supper and to bed, my head full in behalf of Balty, who tells me strange stories of his mother. Among ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... one of these men, and I asked him whither they were bound thus. He answered that he knew not, neither he nor the others; but that evidently they were bound somewhere, since they were impelled by an irresistible desire to ...
— Library Of The World's Best Literature, Ancient And Modern, Vol 4 • Charles Dudley Warner

... already knew of his presence there he could not doubt. That she did not desire his ...
— A Young Man in a Hurry - and Other Short Stories • Robert W. Chambers

... attitudes, your grandiose battles between the hosts of evil and the light of the Tree, your interminable fanfares, was due the age in which you grew. The externality, the pompousness of intention, the theatrical postures, was part of the romantic constitution. The desire to achieve sensational effects, the tendency to externalize, to assume theatrical postures and intend pompously, was inborn in every single one of the men among whom you passed your youth. For they had suddenly, painfully become aware that nature ...
— Musical Portraits - Interpretations of Twenty Modern Composers • Paul Rosenfeld

... and who desire to preserve the integrity of their voice, should abstain from smoking. Because some singers—Faure, in particular—have had a brilliant career despite the inveterate use of tobacco, there is no reason that this example should be followed. Tobacco irritates ...
— The Voice - Its Production, Care and Preservation • Frank E. Miller

... there was no reason why the next ten years should not be a most fruitful period. Unfortunately, during most of that time life was made too easy for him. He knew now that he could write, but he had no desire to write for a living. Probably he felt that such a course would be in some way not quite suitable for a man of fashion. At all events, ten years passed, and middle age was at hand before the promising author began to fulfill his promise. Not till 1819 ...
— Washington Irving • Henry W. Boynton

... occupations created by the demands of modern life and advancing civilization, or whether it will in time succumb to the spirit of modern progress until all occupations shall be emancipated from the tyranny of caste and shall be open to all men who desire to ...
— India, Its Life and Thought • John P. Jones

... "Ah, it only sings with its mistress, who is called Arab Zandyk," and so saying she departed. Muhammed the Discreet on his return home again found his sister disconsolate, and in answer to his inquiries, she said, "I desire Arab Zandyk, mistress of the rose and of the mirror, that I may amuse myself with her ...
— Supplemental Nights, Volume 3 • Richard F. Burton

... pas?" And receiving an answer in the affirmative, Stepan Arkadyevitch, forgetting the favor he had meant to ask of Lidia Ivanovna, and forgetting his sister's affairs, caring for nothing, but filled with the sole desire to get away as soon as possible, went out on tiptoe and ran out into the street as though from a plague-stricken house. For a long while he chatted and joked with his cab-driver, ...
— Anna Karenina • Leo Tolstoy

... "that I know all about your troubles; and you cannot doubt that I desire to make you happy for as long a time as you may remain with me. For this purpose, my honored guests, I have ordered a banquet to be prepared. Fish, fowl, and flesh, roasted, and in luscious stews, and seasoned, I trust, to all your tastes, are ready to be ...
— Tanglewood Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... crept swiftly to the straits Twixt old and new, and drenched the land with blood, And filled it with the reek and stench of war. The War-Lord spoke,— "Despite his love of peace, Our brother of the North has seized his chance, And got his heart's desire." Again I saw,— Where legions poured through the eternal snows, And legions swept o'er every sea to meet Their long-expected onslaught, and the dead Were piled in mountains, and the snows ran red. The War-Lord spoke,— "Up, Britain, up! Strike home! Or drop your rod of Empire ...
— Bees in Amber - A Little Book Of Thoughtful Verse • John Oxenham

... is something of the same sort that we desire to bring about in our children by the education of the will; we wish them to learn to save themselves from the vanities that destroy man, and concentrate on work which causes the inner life ...
— Spontaneous Activity in Education • Maria Montessori

... Sir E. Bulwer Lytton. Few writers have done more, or achieved higher distinction in various walks—as a novelist, poet, dramatist, historian, essayist, orator, and politician. He has worked his way step by step, disdainful of ease, and animated throughout by the ardent desire to excel. On the score of mere industry, there are few living English writers who have written so much, and none that have produced so much of high quality. The industry of Bulwer is entitled to all the ...
— Self Help • Samuel Smiles

... not a boy uttered a sound, save one who exclaimed, "Oh, what a shame!" and then went off to the cricket-field, trying hard, poor little fellow! to suppress the natural desire to cry out and sob, for Slegge had "fetched him," as he termed it, a sounding slap upon the cheek, which echoed in the silence and cut the boy's lips against a ...
— Glyn Severn's Schooldays • George Manville Fenn

... frequent reader of books of theology as such, and as the men of our times have made them. I have looked into the 'Tracts' from curiosity and to hear what the world was talking of, and I was disappointed even in the degree of intellectual power displayed in them. From motives of a desire of theological instruction I very seldom read any book except God's own. The minds of persons are differently constituted; and it is no praise to mine to admit that I am apt to receive less of what is called edification from human discourses on divine subjects, than disturbance and hindrance. I read ...
— The Letters of Elizabeth Barrett Browning (1 of 2) • Frederic G. Kenyon

... did not seem to desire conversation. He lay on his sofa motionless for a quarter of an hour, then reached out for a large book which lay on the ...
— Psmith in the City • P. G. Wodehouse

... eloquence rather than by strength of arm. The story of Ulysses is a signal lesson in the study of human character, and receives a luminous commentary in Shakespeare's adaptation of it. The advice which Ulysses gives to Achilles[29] is a piece of worldly wisdom and may well be acted on by those who desire advancement in life and are little scrupulous in regard to means. The first part of Goethe's "Faust" is another book which has profoundly affected my view of life. I read it first when seventeen years old and have continually re-read it; and, while I fail to comprehend ...
— Historical Essays • James Ford Rhodes

... laid down her bowls, looked at the two stamps, and then at the boy. She was a woman of experience and discernment She saw the muddy, tattered clothes. She read the look of desire ...
— Our Casualty And Other Stories - 1918 • James Owen Hannay, AKA George A. Birmingham

... of my remembrance, as follows:—"'I have the truest esteem for the King of Britain's person; and I set the highest value on his friendship. I have at different times received essential proofs of it; and I desire you would acquaint the King your Master that I will (SIC) never forget them.' His Prussian Majesty afterwards said something with respect to myself, and then asked me several questions about indifferent things and persons. ...
— History of Friedrich II. of Prussia, Vol. XVI. (of XXI.) - Frederick The Great—The Ten Years of Peace.—1746-1756. • Thomas Carlyle

... must seem to you INCREDIBLE boldness (!), and do not think worse of me than I deserve. It seems such a pity that you should be so near and yet that I should lose this chance of gratifying my great desire. If you knew how I prized the name of Bunker you would understand; but no doubt I am only one among many, and you do understand better than I ...
— Count Bunker • J. Storer Clouston

... caught his breath. Something, he did not know what, seemed to jar him rudely from that pure desire for her salvation; he said, stumblingly, that he would ALWAYS care for her soul!—"for—for any one's soul." And was she quite well? His voice broke with tenderness. She must be careful to avoid the chill of these autumnal afternoons; "you ...
— The Voice • Margaret Deland

... mood, was making his devotions to God to send him good chance and fortune in his voyage" when a man "clad in ane blue gown" appeared to him, and with little ceremony declared to the King that he had been sent to desire him "nocht to pass whither he purposed," for if he did, things "would not fare well with him or any who went with him." How little this warning was heeded by the King is known to all readers of Scottish history. The "ghost," ...
— From John O'Groats to Land's End • Robert Naylor and John Naylor

... enough, outwardly, "circumstances, of which I cannot speak, have made it necessary for me to leave New York. I do not desire that the place of my destination shall be known to any one. But to show you how much I appreciate your kindness, and how entirely I trust you, I will inform you that I am going to Lightfield, in New Hampshire, to stop an indefinite ...
— The Fatal Glove • Clara Augusta Jones Trask

... an ambitious man; he was more, he was a profound egotist. In his character pride, the love of power, the desire for wealth, were evenly balanced and made subservient to a most indomitable will. Those who knew him well said he was a hard self-sufficient man, one who never forgot an injury ...
— Wee Wifie • Rosa Nouchette Carey

... royalty and the high aristocracy who, with changed names lived in seclusion. Society, therefore, to meet the mass-desire, was driven to simple ways of living. Men gave up their silks and velvets and frills, lace and jewels for cloth, linen, and sombre neck-cloths. The women did the same; they wore muslin gowns and their own hair, and went ...
— Woman as Decoration • Emily Burbank

... cat-boat on some errand of his own which nobody questioned, and now there suddenly resounded the surprising notes of his violin. It was very pretty to hear his familiar old tunes over the water, and everybody respected Seth's amiable desire to afford entertainment, even if he failed a little now and then in time or tone. He had mastered several old Scottish and English airs in the book Betty had given him, and already had become proficient in some ...
— Betty Leicester - A Story For Girls • Sarah Orne Jewett

... the money you sent me do for the present, and will send you my term bills as you desire. You can depend upon my settling up as cheap as possible, though I confess I have not hitherto been nearly as economical as I might have been. Now that I know it is necessary, you shall have no reason to ...
— Walter Sherwood's Probation • Horatio Alger

... acquired on the European Continent, and in every part of the civilised world where the fame of Bonaparte has ever reached, sufficiently establish the merits of M. de Bourrienne as a biographer. These merits seem to us to consist chiefly in an anxious desire to be impartial, to point out the defects as well as the merits of a most wonderful man; and in a peculiarly graphic power of relating facts and anecdotes. With this happy faculty Bourrienne would have made the life of almost any active individual interesting; ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton

... smaller than usual. But there was an earnest purpose in the faces of many who came, and the clergyman, as he looked round at the little company when he gave out his text, felt that many of them had not come from mere curiosity, but from an honest desire to hear the Word of God. And he lifted up his heart in very earnest prayer, that to many in that room the Word which he was about to speak might be a ...
— Christie's Old Organ - Or, "Home, Sweet Home" • Mrs. O. F. Walton

... Christians, with the Christian's faith in their hearts, so lose the possession of themselves—and so violate all that they profess as followers of Jesus! I confess, if this be the manner in which Christianity is intended to operate upon the character, I am as yet wholly ignorant of it, and desire ever to remain so. But it is not possible that they are right. Nay, they seem in some sort to have acknowledged themselves to have been in the wrong by the last acts of the meeting. This brings to my mind what Paul has often told ...
— Aurelian - or, Rome in the Third Century • William Ware

... that all value can be traced to supply and demand. Now, although the Gigerl was but a single doll, the supply of him, so to speak, had been surprisingly abundant, and the demand, if represented by the desire of any one person concerned to possess him, may be represented by the smallest of zeros. The consideration of so intricate a question belongs neither to the inventor of fiction nor to the historian of facts, and ...
— A Cigarette-Maker's Romance • F. Marion Crawford

... I say, Sir Ethelred? A new man's antagonism to old methods. A desire to know something at first hand. Some impatience. It's my old work, but the harness is different. It has been chafing me a little in one or ...
— The Secret Agent - A Simple Tale • Joseph Conrad

... fatalistic pessimism. It wears a very different aspect nowadays, in the light of Eugenics. "To the eugenist," as Davenport observes, "heredity stands as the one great hope of the human race: its saviour from imbecility, poverty, disease, immorality."[40] We cannot, indeed, desire any compulsory elimination of the unfit or any centrally regulated breeding of the fit.[41] Such notions are idle, and even the mere fact that unbalanced brains may air them abroad tends to impair the legitimate authority of eugenic ideals. The two measures which are now commonly put forward ...
— The Task of Social Hygiene • Havelock Ellis

... woman of sober thoughtfulness to the woman of feeling, the woman eager to give, eager to receive. At that moment it seemed as though her sex possessed her to the exclusion of everything outside. Her eyes were soft and filled with the desire of love, her lips sweet and tremulous. She had suddenly created a new atmosphere around her, an atmosphere ...
— The Devil's Paw • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... that treaty, on account of some extraordinary claims of the British party. They claim Sugar, or St. George's Island, and inland, by the St. Louis, or Fond du Lac. Both claims are unsupported by either reason, evidence, or anything but their desire to gain something. We, of course, claim Sugar Island, and will not relinquish it under any circumstances. We also claim inland by the Kamanistiquia, and have sustained this claim by much evidence. The Pigeon River by the Grand Portage will be the boundary, ...
— Personal Memoirs Of A Residence Of Thirty Years With The Indian Tribes On The American Frontiers • Henry Rowe Schoolcraft

... Fruit. Do you think it possible that there are not Families and Taverns in Eden. that would give reasonably for young pease and Beans in July and Aug^t if they could get them. Suppose now you sent a dish of young pease or Beans to any of your Customers when only old are to be had, and desire them to let their acquaintances know you can furnish the like, don't you think they would go off, or if you got into the custom of such as Mrs. Thom, who keeps a Tavern, do you believe she would not find people who would be glad of them, and so would take from you. Possibly ...
— The Jacobite Rebellions (1689-1746) - (Bell's Scottish History Source Books.) • James Pringle Thomson

... the conditions under which the British officials should proceed to Yunnan, and what their powers should be on their arrival there. The Chinese government showed, in the opinion of Mr. Wade, a strong desire to avoid fulfilling its part of the contract. The negotiations on several occasions assumed an acute character of danger. Both parties prepared for war. The English minister concentrated the English fleet in the China seas; the Chinese government bought up large ...
— The Galaxy, Volume 23, No. 2, February, 1877 • Various

... The desire to unlock the closed doors of this ancient treasure house, awakened at that time, led to a series of classes on the Upanishads at The Vedanta Centre of Boston during its early days in St. Botolph Street. The translation and commentary then given were transcribed and, after studious revision, ...
— The Upanishads • Swami Paramananda

... become. Later he went to Malta, and was detained there by another bad attack of tertian fever. The next record of consequence is from the "Volage" frigate, at sea, June 29, 1811, when he writes in a despondent strain to Hodgson, that he is returning home "without a hope, and almost without a desire," to wrangle with creditors and lawyers about executions and coal pits. "In short, I am sick and sorry; and when I have a little repaired my irreparable affairs, away I shall march, either to campaign in Spain, ...
— Byron • John Nichol

... the officer and non-commissioned officer on duty will frequently patrol the trench line, to see that the sentries are alert and to receive any reports they may desire to make. ...
— Military Instructors Manual • James P. Cole and Oliver Schoonmaker

... afternoon he confessed that he had failed to estimate accurately the strength of the Sinn Fein movement. He might have been wrong in not suppressing it before, but his omission to do so was due to a consuming desire to keep Ireland's front united in face ...
— Punch, or the London Charivari, Vol. 150, May 10, 1916 • Various

... Florestan. Now, as Litzman notes, the answer to that outcry came back to him over the head of the audience. Clara knew he would be there, and that he would understand. Her fingers seemed to be giving expression not only to his own yearning, but to her answer and her like desire. It was a bold effort to declare her love before the world, and, as she wrote him later: "Do you not realise that I played it since I knew no other way to express my innermost feelings at all. Secretly, I did not dare express them, though I did it openly. Do you imagine that my heart did ...
— The Love Affairs of Great Musicians, Volume 2 • Rupert Hughes

... operating at a period of prosperity with full employment and rising wages, they did not realize a necessity for concerted action; the era of the boycotts had not yet begun. As for having a common agency to do the work of organizing, the trade unions of the early eighties had no keen desire to organize any but the skilled workmen; and, since the competition of workmen in small towns had not yet made itself felt, each national trade union strove to organize primarily the workmen of its trade in the ...
— A History of Trade Unionism in the United States • Selig Perlman

... animal, that an herb? How comes any particular thing to be of this or that sort, but because it has that nominal essence; or, which is all one, agrees to that abstract idea, that name is annexed to? And I desire any one but to reflect on his own thoughts, when he hears or speaks any of those or other names of substances, to know what sort of essences ...
— An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume II. - MDCXC, Based on the 2nd Edition, Books III. and IV. (of 4) • John Locke

... His people. The hands which were pierced for us on the cross are over us and about us. They carry us, guide us, hold us and keep us. We are His and nothing can separate us from Him in time and in eternity. With a joyful heart we can say "I am my Beloved's and His desire is toward me." ...
— The Lord of Glory - Meditations on the person, the work and glory of our Lord Jesus Christ • Arno Gaebelein

... as Fort Duquesne had fallen hurried home, resigned his commission, and was married. The sunshine and glitter of the wedding day must have appeared to Washington deeply appropriate, for he certainly seemed to have all that heart of man could desire. Just twenty-seven, in the first flush of young manhood, keen of sense and yet wise in experience, life must have looked very fair and smiling. He had left the army with a well-earned fame, and had come home to take the wife of his choice, and enjoy ...
— Good Stories For Great Holidays - Arranged for Story-Telling and Reading Aloud and for the - Children's Own Reading • Frances Jenkins Olcott

... after a long absence. I have seen at my mother's—Mrs Clennam in the city—a young woman working at her needle, whom I have only heard addressed or spoken of as Little Dorrit. I have felt sincerely interested in her, and have had a great desire to know something more about her. I saw her, not a minute before you came up, pass ...
— Little Dorrit • Charles Dickens

... Jews Moses, and the Christians Jesus, each for their prophet," I said, after which not very satisfactory answer to him, the conversation dropped. He now inquired if I had written to Tripoli to bring plenty of sugar and tea, with a latent desire for a portion of the spoil. I told him "No," ...
— Travels in the Great Desert of Sahara, in the Years of 1845 and 1846 • James Richardson

... to the woman's need there cannot be any doubt. All developed women desire to be loved, says Ellen Key, not "en male" but "en artiste" (Liebe und Ehe, p. 92). "Only a man of whom she feels that he has also the artist's joy in her, and who shows this joy through his timid and delicate touch on her ...
— Studies in the Psychology of Sex, Volume 6 (of 6) • Havelock Ellis

... second time, and it turned his curiosity into a desire to probe the mystery. He concluded to put off the interview with his nephew, and see him later in the day. He hailed a cab, and told the driver to take him ...
— In Friendship's Guise • Wm. Murray Graydon

... productive base and improving social welfare. Model education, social, and environment programs in Bhutan are underway with support from multilateral development organizations. Each economic program takes into account the government's desire to protect the country's environment and cultural traditions. Detailed controls and uncertain policies in areas like industrial licensing, trade, labor, and finance continue to hamper foreign investment. Major hydroelectric projects will lead expansion ...
— The 2002 CIA World Factbook • US Government

... brought him from Chicago as a puppy, and he had grown to be a sterling watch-dog, sensible and affectionate. There was also a cat, Jimmy Woods, so called after a boy Vesta knew, and to whom she insisted the cat bore a marked resemblance. There was a singing thrush, guarded carefully against a roving desire for bird-food on the part of Jimmy Woods, and a jar of goldfish. So this little household drifted along quietly and dreamily indeed, but always with the undercurrent of feeling which ran so still because it ...
— Jennie Gerhardt - A Novel • Theodore Dreiser

... started violently, for there was another dull heavy thud, and some one hissed as if drawing in his breath to suppress the strong desire to ...
— To Win or to Die - A Tale of the Klondike Gold Craze • George Manville Fenn

... the preceding statement, it must be clearly understood that I neither desire to affirm that the Engis and Neanderthal skulls belong to the Australian race, nor to assert even that the ancient skulls belong to one and the same race, so far as race is measured by language, colour of skin, or character of hair. Against ...
— The Antiquity of Man • Charles Lyell

... of Providence is the life of man! And by what secret differing springs are the affections hurried about, as differing circumstances present! To-day we love what to-morrow we hate; to-day we seek what to-morrow we shun; to-day we desire what to-morrow we fear; nay, even tremble at the apprehensions of. This was exemplified in me at this time in the most lively manner imaginable; for I, whose only affliction was, that I seemed banished from human society, that I was alone, circumscribed by the boundless ocean, cut off from ...
— The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe (1808) • Daniel Defoe

... the Royal family. His principal desire was to attend the French Academy; but as the Academy did not permit strangers to address their meetings, Jasmin was under the necessity of adopting another method. The Salons ...
— Jasmin: Barber, Poet, Philanthropist • Samuel Smiles

... called, the yesterday. And I did observe it to be a very bleak and desolate Country, and not given over to fire, or other warmth, nor to sulphur-vapours; but to be very quiet, and with but a little light in all its breadth. And I could conceive that it was no place for anything of life to desire; but rather to avoid; and that Country did seem to be yet all about me; for I was by no means come clear from it at that time; though, Northward, there was a glimmer, as of fire-holes; and beyond those, the strange shining of the Plain of Blue Fire. And, after that I ...
— The Night Land • William Hope Hodgson

... penitent both during his illness and since his recovery. His one great desire now was to get away from home, for home to him was a place of torment. Bobby suspected all this, and in his great heart he pitied his companion. He did not know what ...
— Now or Never - The Adventures of Bobby Bright • Oliver Optic

... I desire to sweep off my old friends with the old year, and begin the new with a clean record. It is a measure absolutely necessary. The snake does not put on his new skin over the old one. He sloughs off the first, before he dons the second. ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume IV. (of X.) • Various

... lustily. He had grown used to being driven in on himself, and to living apart from children of his own age. He was ashamed of not being clever at games, and dared not take part in their sport. And he used to pretend to take no interest in it, although he was consumed by the desire to be asked to play with them. But they never said anything to him, and then he would go away ...
— Jean-Christophe, Vol. I • Romain Rolland

... some plan of management which would avert the disease they had so much reason to apprehend. I felt the responsibility of the trust, and endeavoured to find it to the best of my ability. Every opportunity which I could desire was afforded me; for the infant, from its birth was submitted to my direction; and both the disposition and ability existed, on the part of the parents, to carry implicitly into effect every ...
— North American Medical and Surgical Journal, Vol. 2, No. 3, July, 1826 • Various

... planned and wrote that sermon, would not be true; for, though morbidly conscientious on many points and earnestly striving to be a faithful shepherd of the souls committed to his care, Arthur Leighton possessed the natural desire that those who listened to him should not only think well of what he taught but also of the form in which the teaching was presented. When he became a clergyman he did not cease to be a man, with all a man's capacity to love and to be loved, and so, though he fought and prayed against it, ...
— The Rector of St. Mark's • Mary J. Holmes

... picture of the many spiritual conflicts that have passed betwixt God and my soul before I could subject mine to the will of Jesus my master, in whose service I have now found perfect freedom. Desire him to read it; and then, if he can think it may turn to the advantage of any dejected poor soul, let it be made public; if not, let him burn it, for I and it are less than the least of ...
— English Literature - Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English Speaking World • William J. Long

... equal, to the best hotel. Here comes in the American principle of Competition, the keynote of all our enterprise. Competition is to do for us what the hope of earthly immortality did for the builders of the Pyramids, what the desire to glorify God did for the builders of the cathedrals. It is to be the soul of our art: what sort of a body it is to put on, we shall presently see. Even now it is safe to assume that no more such granite prisons as the 'Revere' or ...
— Continental Monthly, Volume 5, Issue 4 • Various

... here lay the quarry he had sought so long. Italy, the fountain-head of intellectual enlightenment for Europe, was the realm which he must win. Italy alone offered the fulcrum needed by his firm and limitless desire of domination over souls. It was with Caraffa and the Theatines that Ignatius obtained a home. They were now established in the States of S. Mark through the beneficence of a rich Venetian noble, Girolamo Miani, who had opened religious houses and placed ...
— Renaissance in Italy, Volumes 1 and 2 - The Catholic Reaction • John Addington Symonds

... anticipation. Many farmers and organizations have been greatly interested in securing and distributing the seedlings, and some of the requests for seedlings have been very interesting, in that they show such a great desire on the part of the farmers to secure the trees, and it has been with extreme regret that we were obliged to return their money, because of lack ...
— Northern Nut Growers Association Report of the Proceedings at the Fifth Annual Meeting - Evansville, Indiana, August 20 and 21, 1914 • Various

... Embassy desires the troops to know that both here and at Washington there is a full understanding of the difficulties of the work which they are being called upon to do and a desire no less ardent than their own that they should realize as soon as possible the blessings of the peace which is foreshadowed by the armistice on ...
— The History of the American Expedition Fighting the Bolsheviki - Campaigning in North Russia 1918-1919 • Joel R. Moore

... the soil; and the ordinary mode followed in practice of dividing them into clays, loams, etc. etc., which we need not here particularize, fulfils all that can be done until we have more minute information regarding a large number of soils. Those of our readers who desire more full information on this point are referred to the works of Thaer, Schuebler, and others, where the subject ...
— Elements of Agricultural Chemistry • Thomas Anderson

... servants," answered Mr Marshall: "and we need think no scorn thereof, since our Lord Himself took on Him the form of a servant. Howbeit, for this even, the chief question is, Doth any of you gentlewomen desire to return with ...
— It Might Have Been - The Story of the Gunpowder Plot • Emily Sarah Holt



Words linked to "Desire" :   starve, wish well, request, passion, desire to know, take to, quest, wishing, greed, hungriness, sexual desire, temptation, thirstiness, philistinism, trust, ambition, feel like, miss, lech after, lust after, tendency, rage, dream, go for, inclination, thirst, caprice, crave, hope, craving, want, yearn, itch, arousal, materialism, longing, like, hanker, yearning, concupiscence, spoil, aspiration, desirous, call for, whim, bloodlust, envy, wish, feeling, bespeak, lust, seek, fancy, physical attraction, long, care, hunger



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