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Gratification   Listen
noun
Gratification  n.  
1.
The act of gratifying, or pleasing, either the mind, the taste, or the appetite; as, the gratification of the palate, of the appetites, of the senses, of the desires, of the heart.
2.
That which affords pleasure; satisfaction; enjoyment; fruition: delight.
3.
A reward; a recompense; a gratuity.






Collaborative International Dictionary of English 0.48








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"Gratification" Quotes from Famous Books



... persisted in refusing medicine. Cicatrization was somewhat delayed; immediately on leaving the hospital she returned to her old habits, but the pain and hemorrhage attending copulation was so great that she had finally to desist. The vagina, however, gradually yielding, ceased to interfere with the gratification of her desires. Toward the end of June the menses reappeared and flowed with the greatest regularity. The portions discharged are preserved in ...
— Anomalies and Curiosities of Medicine • George M. Gould

... in the Middle Age. The legends which tell us how woman was then the civilizer, the softener, the purifier, the perpetual witness to fierce and coarse men, that there were nobler aims in life than pleasure, and power, and the gratification of revenge; that not self-assertion, but self-sacrifice was the Divine ideal, toward which all must aspire. These old legends are immortal; for they speak of facts and laws which will endure as long as there are women upon earth. Through the woman, the civilizer and the Christianizer ...
— All Saints' Day and Other Sermons • Charles Kingsley

... whiskey with gratification, he luxuriated in the presence of the landlady, very confident of the strength of her liking for him. He glanced at her profile—that fine throw-back of her hostile head, wicked in the midst of her benevolence; ...
— Aaron's Rod • D. H. Lawrence

... is just a week since I had the greatest gratification of its kind I ever, I think, experienced:—so kind a thought, so sweet a surprise as was my dearest father's visit! How softly and soothingly it has rested upon ...
— Highways and Byways in Surrey • Eric Parker

... safety of the federal system, I can not avoid repeating my earnest hope that all good citizens who take a proper interest in the success and harmony of our admirable political institutions, and who are incapable of desiring to convert an opposite state of things into means for the gratification of personal ambition, will, laying aside minor considerations and discarding local prejudices, unite their honest exertions to establish some fixed general principle which shall be calculated to effect the greatest extent of public good in ...
— A Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents, - Vol. 2, Part 3, Andrew Jackson, 1st term • Edited by James D. Richardson

... how Mrs. Austin had admired the mare. No doubt she would grieve at the fate that had befallen her, and that would give them something to talk about. His own escape would interest her, too, and—Law realized, not without some natural gratification, that he would appear to her as ...
— Heart of the Sunset • Rex Beach

... forgot; but Mrs. Blanchard reminded him and added that Chris had returned in no very good humour, then trudged up to Newtake to see Phoebe. Cool and calm the widow stood before Clement's announcement, expressed her gratification, and gave him joy of the promised change in ...
— Children of the Mist • Eden Phillpotts

... mismeasurement. There are modes of the love of our country which are definitely selfish, as a cat's of the hearthrug, yet entirely balanced and calm in judicial faculty; passions which determine conduct, but have no influence on opinion. For instance, I have bought for my own exclusive gratification, the cottage in which I am writing, near the lake-beach on which I used to play when I was seven years old. Were I a public-spirited scientific person, or a benevolently pious one, I should doubtless, instead, be surveying the geographical relations of the Mountains of the Moon, ...
— On the Old Road, Vol. 2 (of 2) - A Collection of Miscellaneous Essays and Articles on Art and Literature • John Ruskin

... responded to this shock, not like sectionalists, but like Americans. "Every man of them," Page records, "expressed almost a personal sorrow. Little was said of politics or of parties. Mr. Garfield was President of the United States—that was enough. A dozen voices spoke the great gratification that the assassin was not a Southern man. It was an affecting scene to see weather-beaten old countrymen so profoundly agitated—men who yesterday I should have supposed hardly knew and certainly did not seem to care who was President. The great centres of population, ...
— The Life and Letters of Walter H. Page, Volume I • Burton J. Hendrick

... he at once identified himself with the football men, and they welcomed him gladly as assistant coach. During that first season, two years ago, he had come to know and like Fred Blake. Later, the fullback took Diemann's course in Psychology, and to the elder man's gratification, developed a passion for the subject. The instructor recognized the quality of the athlete's mind, and before long the two were working together, reading and discussing along the line of the teacher's ...
— Stanford Stories - Tales of a Young University • Charles K. Field

... economies which the young man sent home to his parents seem to have deeply touched them, for on July 10, 1813, his father writes to him: "Your economy, industry, and success in pursuing your professional studies give your affectionate parents the highest gratification and reward. We wish you to avoid carrying your economy to an extreme. Let your appearance be suited to the respectable company you keep, and your living such as will conduce most effectually to preserve health of body and vigor of mind. We shall all be willing to make sacrifices at home ...
— Samuel F. B. Morse, His Letters and Journals - In Two Volumes, Volume I. • Samuel F. B. Morse

... to him that they should spend a few weeks in Paris for the gratification of any praiseworthy intention of her own, or of any harmless whim, he would have unhesitatingly refused, and opposed any number of objections to the proposition; but she had introduced the subject in its most favorable light, and was sure ...
— Fairy Fingers - A Novel • Anna Cora Mowatt Ritchie

... turns to her old friend for protection. Blowers, maddened with disappointment, would rather sacrifice her to infamy than sell her for money to a good master. The price of a pretty slave is no object with this boasting democrat,—the gratification of his carnal desires soars supreme. Rosebrook knows this, as the abject woman does to ...
— Our World, or, The Slaveholders Daughter • F. Colburn Adams

... only intellectual gratification in these places is afforded by the Arab story-tellers, among whom are a few eminent and clever men: soon after his entrance, a group begins to form around the gifted man, who, after a suitable pause, to collect hearers or whet their expectations, begins his story. ...
— All About Coffee • William H. Ukers

... prominent and powerful, desire, so far as its fruition is pleasure, has expressed but the lowest emotions of the religious sentiment. Something more than this has always been asked by sensitively religious minds. Success fails to bring the gratification it promises. The wish granted, the mind turns from it in satiety. Not this, after ...
— The Religious Sentiment - Its Source and Aim: A Contribution to the Science and - Philosophy of Religion • Daniel G. Brinton

... obtained it of a soldier, who refused to sell it, but who gladly gave it to me when he heard it was for the king. Afterward he conceived a doubt that I had deceived him, and that I had obtained his treasure for my own gratification. He followed me, and I wager he is standing without longing to know if the king is really ...
— Berlin and Sans-Souci • Louise Muhlbach

... young lady with a smile—almost a triumphant smile—as he said this. She had been seated next him at dinner, and he had paid her considerable attention—attention which had not been received by her with quite that air of gratification which Mr. Level's graceful compliments were apt to cause. He was not angry with her, however. He contemplated her with a gentle indulgence, as an ...
— The Lovels of Arden • M. E. Braddon

... forcible obligation of the sacred covenants (which, when preserved, serve as a strong barrier against all such usurpations), framed a hellish and almost unbounded toleration in Scotland, of heretical and sectarian errors, for gratification of the abettors thereof, which was followed with a deluge of irreligion and impiety, drowning the nation in a still ...
— Act, Declaration, & Testimony for the Whole of our Covenanted Reformation, as Attained to, and Established in Britain and Ireland; Particularly Betwixt the Years 1638 and 1649, Inclusive • The Reformed Presbytery

... truth, honesty, duty, and purpose for the sake of possession. She is not the woman ever to make me swamp honour and poise and right conduct in the vortex of blind sex passion. She is not the woman to arouse in me such uncontrolled desire that for gratification I would do one ill deed, or put the slightest hurt upon the least of human creatures. She is not the most beautiful woman God Almighty ever planted on His footstool. (There have been and are many women as true and pure and ...
— The Kempton-Wace Letters • Jack London

... flat, broad head and slightly almond eyes and long mustache. His cheek bones were high and his jaw square and cruel. He settled into his coat-collar the way a cat shortens its neck when it purrs. He, too, was purring, from gratification, perhaps, at having his portrait painted; but, wholly untrustworthy himself, he distrusted the world and held himself ready ...
— Trapped in 'Black Russia' - Letters June-November 1915 • Ruth Pierce

... that self-will constantly crops up and complicates the case by representing that the line suggested by the Holy Spirit is not in reality in accord with our interests. This opposition between the seeming interests suggested by self-will, which indeed often contribute to our immediate gratification, and our true interests as indicated by the monitions of the Holy Spirit, constitutes the real struggle of the life during the period of probation. The will of God in every circumstance is usually plain enough; but it is silenced by the clamour of the ...
— Our Lady Saint Mary • J. G. H. Barry

... hour. No one moved. Our hearts sank within us. After about four hours the guards gave some loud grunts, and some of their companions starting up took their places. They seemed to watch the countenance of their victim with intense gratification. If, in spite of the bodily pain and mental suffering he was enduring, he dropped asleep, one of them would throw a burning brand at him, to rouse him up again to a full consciousness of his position. It was with the greatest ...
— Dick Onslow - Among the Redskins • W.H.G. Kingston

... feeling—spiritual pleasure as well as sensual bliss. A subtle fire flowed through my veins. What I dreamed was not of kissing you, not of holding you in my arms; it was not only the wish to relieve the tormenting sting of my desire, and to cool the sweet fire by gratification. It was not for your lips that I longed, or for your eyes, or for your body; no, it was a romantic confusion of all of these things, a marvelous mingling of memories and desires. All the mysteries of caprice in man and woman seemed to hover about me, when suddenly in my solitude your real ...
— The German Classics of The Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Vol. IV • Editor-in-Chief: Kuno Francke

... the loyal salutations of the crowd right graciously. The little prince was charming in his friendly gestures, and Paul observed that to one and another of the knights and gentlemen drawn up to do them honour he held out some little token, which was received with every demonstration of respect and gratification. ...
— In the Wars of the Roses - A Story for the Young • Evelyn Everett-Green

... words ensued. Lady Kirton accused him of wishing to sacrifice them to his own selfish gratification. Lord Hartledon felt uncomfortable at the accusation. One of the best-hearted men living, he did nothing in his vacillation. He would go in the evening, he said to himself, when they could not watch ...
— Elster's Folly • Mrs. Henry Wood

... geranium, because I see them so often in the windows of cottages where there is little else; and if I preferred such inexpensive indulgences as thinking and reading and wandering in the fields to the doubtful gratification arising from kept- up appearances (always for the bedazzlement of the people opposite, and therefore always vulgar), I believe I should have enough left over to buy a radish to eat with my bread; and if the weather were fine, and I could eat it under a tree, and give a robin some crumbs ...
— The Solitary Summer • Elizabeth von Arnim

... leaning far over the next seat, which was unoccupied. "Like some lemon?" he said to Emmy. Together they inspected the box of chocolates, which contained much imitation-lace paper and a few sweets. "Not half a sell," grumbled Alf to himself, thinking of the shilling he had paid; but he looked with gratification at Emmy's face as she enjoyingly ate the chocolates. As her excitement a little strained her nervous endurance Emmy began to pale under the eyes; her eyes seemed to grow larger; she lost the first air of sparkle, but she became more pathetic. ...
— Nocturne • Frank Swinnerton

... ride was another source of gratification to Briggs. Seated beside me, the wind beating on his sightless orbs, he discoursed of the wonders of petrol. "Proper to take you about, them cars. W'ere are we now? 'Ave we far to run, like?" I told him we were traversing Battersea Park and that our destination ...
— Observations of an Orderly - Some Glimpses of Life and Work in an English War Hospital • Ward Muir

... and, he believes, most triumphantly; as, however, he is in the cue for writing, which he seldom is, he will for his own gratification, and for the sake of others, dropping metaphors about vipers and serpents, show up in particular two or three sets or cliques of people, who, he is happy to say, have been particularly virulent against him and his work, for nothing indeed ...
— The Romany Rye • George Borrow

... enquiry. Although all my thinking life has been concerned, off and on, in contemplating the problem of our religious instincts, the sundry attempts which have been made by mankind for securing their gratification, and the important question as to their objective justification, it is only in advanced years that I have clearly perceived wherein the first principles of such a research must consist. And I doubt whether any one has hitherto clearly defined this point. The principles ...
— Thoughts on Religion • George John Romanes

... day, when Douglas went down to the Spencer ranch to borrow the paraphernalia for dehorning, his father beckoned him mysteriously into the cowshed. John had been surly for six months and Douglas was surprised to hear the note of gratification in his voice. ...
— Judith of the Godless Valley • Honore Willsie

... gratification at these words, and he would then have withdrawn, but neither Miss Carleton nor young Mainwaring gave him an opportunity to do so without seeming discourteous. Both drew him into conversation and found him exceedingly entertaining, ...
— That Mainwaring Affair • Maynard Barbour

... but the old man who was with Capt. C. would accompany us if we wished him and that he was better informed of the country than any of them. matters being thus far arranged I directed the fiddle to be played and the party danced very merily much to the amusement and gratification of the natives, though I must confess that the state of my own mind at this moment did not well accord with the prevailing mirth as I somewhat feared that the caprice of the indians might suddenly induce them to withhold ...
— The Journals of Lewis and Clark • Meriwether Lewis et al

... after the first appearance of Leaves of Grass, the English reading public may be prepared for a selection of Whitman's poems, and soon hereafter for a complete edition of them? I trust this may prove to be the case. At any rate, it has been a great gratification to me to be concerned in the experiment; and this is enhanced by my being enabled to associate with it your name, as that of an early and well-qualified appreciator of Whitman, and no less as that of ...
— Poems By Walt Whitman • Walt Whitman

... the tendency to self-indulgence. "A most important factor begins to exert pressure upon the infant at birth and continues throughout its life," says Kempf. "It is the incessant, continuous pressure of the herd ... to conventionalize its methods of acquiring the gratification of its needs."[5] The emotions thus denied a natural outlet seek other channels of activity which have received the ...
— Taboo and Genetics • Melvin Moses Knight, Iva Lowther Peters, and Phyllis Mary Blanchard

... two men that it was no small gratification to the Harkaway party to see once more in ...
— Jack Harkaway and his son's Escape From the Brigand's of Greece • Bracebridge Hemyng

... looked like Grimshaw. Not exactly, of course. The nose was coarser—it had not that Wellington spring at the bridge, nor the curved nostrils. But it might have been a dirty, unshaven, dead Grimshaw lying there. Waram told me that he felt a shock of gratification before he heard the poet's voice behind him: "What's this? A drunkard?" He shook his head and opened the dead man's shirt to feel for any possible flutter of life in the heart. There was none. And he thought: "If this were only Grimshaw! If the whole miserable business ...
— O. Henry Memorial Award Prize Stories of 1921 • Various

... England of the Stuarts and the France of the Bourbons found in colonies a refuge for their discontented or venturesome subjects, a source of profit for their merchants, a field for the exercise of religious zeal, or gratification for national pride. Everywhere were commerce and colonization growing apace, and especially were they beginning to play a large part in the national life of England and of France. We have already noticed how the Dutch, themselves the despoilers of Portugal [Footnote: See above, ...
— A Political and Social History of Modern Europe V.1. • Carlton J. H. Hayes

... you could fairly admire her graceful form and beauteous face, she had bounded off again in the mazy dance, to the intense gratification of ...
— Jack Harkaway's Boy Tinker Among The Turks - Book Number Fifteen in the Jack Harkaway Series • Bracebridge Hemyng

... that theory by analogy so long as we are ignorant of the precise significance which the natives themselves attached to these remarkable performances. There is no clear evidence that the dramas were acted for the amusement and gratification of the ghost rather than for the edification of the spectators. One important act certainly represented, and might well be intended to facilitate, the final departure of the spirit of the deceased to the land ...
— The Belief in Immortality and the Worship of the Dead, Volume I (of 3) • Sir James George Frazer

... stick, and climbed the great staircase to the card-room without any distinct recollection of performing any of these simple and reasonable actions. In the cardroom he exchanged a few greetings with friends, accepted without comment or without the slightest tinge of gratification a little chorus of chafing congratulations upon his latest triumph, and left the room without any inclination to play, although there was a vacant place at his favourite table. From sheer purposelessness he wandered back again into the hall, and here came his ...
— The Evil Shepherd • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... provide for all that at home," Mrs. Proudie had rapidly replied; with which opinion I must here profess that I cannot by any means bring myself to coincide. But a conversazione would give play to no sensual propensity, nor occasion that intolerable expense which the gratification of sensual propensities too often produces. Mrs. Proudie felt that the word was not all that she could have desired. It was a little faded by old use and present oblivion, and seemed to address itself to that portion of the ...
— Framley Parsonage • Anthony Trollope

... writer might be deceived himself; it was also possible that he might have some view in wilfully deceiving me: The falsehood might procure some little reward for the kindness and zeal which it placed to his account, or it might give him an importance which would at least be a gratification to his vanity. It behoved me, however, to take the same measures as if I had known it to be true; and I must confess, that I was not perfectly at ease when I recollected the recal of the Secretary and Le Cerf, with ...
— A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels, Vol. 12 • Robert Kerr

... Madame Brohan have warmed and condescended to Madame Broisat in the Marquis de Villemer. It was my part to accompany our guests ashore: when I kissed the little girl good-bye at the pier steps, Vaekehu gave a cry of gratification—reached down her hand into the boat, took mine, and pressed it with that flattering softness which seems the coquetry of the old lady in every quarter of the earth. The next moment she had taken Stanislao's arm, and they moved off along the pier ...
— The Works of Robert Louis Stevenson - Swanston Edition Vol. 18 (of 25) • Robert Louis Stevenson

... and proper feeling to the persons concerned? I have a horror of that man of the grave-yard, and needless publicity and exposure—I rely on you, dearest friend of ours, to at least lend us your influence when the time shall come—a word may be invaluable. If there is any show made, or gratification of strangers' curiosity, far better that I had left the turf untouched. These things occur through sheer thoughtlessness, carelessness, not anything worse, but the effect is irreparable. I won't think any more of it—now—at least. . ...
— Life and Letters of Robert Browning • Mrs. Sutherland Orr

... your hat off for me in the rain? Put it on again!" she insisted with a little tone of command, and she was conscious of gratification when ...
— Whispering Smith • Frank H. Spearman

... thought neither of fame or fortune. The narrowness of his views and the disinterestedness of his soul alike precluded him from regarding Geneva as a stage for the gratification of personal ambition. This abegnation of self was one great part of ...
— Occasional Papers - Selected from The Guardian, The Times, and The Saturday Review, - 1846-1890 • R.W. Church

... pleasant, if we could have the desire granted; but duty is greater than desire, and circumstances may at times impel us to the performance of the one rather than favor us with the gratification of the other. What I mean is, that it is our duty sometimes to take a part in scenes in which our hearts cannot ...
— Dawn • Mrs. Harriet A. Adams

... Church and the world. And Fra Girolamo's mind never stopped short of that sublimest end: the objects towards which he felt himself working had always the same moral magnificence. He had no private malice—he sought no petty gratification. Even in the last terrible days, when ignominy, torture, and the fear of torture, had laid bare every hidden weakness of his soul, he could say to his importunate judges: "Do not wonder if it seems to you ...
— Romola • George Eliot

... under the treaty of February 2, 1897, between Great Britain and Venezuela, to determine the boundary line between the latter and the colony of British Guiana, is to convene at Paris during the present month. It is a source of much gratification to this Government to see the friendly resort of arbitration applied to the settlement of this controversy, not alone because of the earnest part we have had in bringing about the result, but also because the two members named on behalf of Venezuela, Mr. Chief Justice Fuller and Mr. Justice Brewer, ...
— Compilation of the Messages and Papers of the Presidents • William McKinley

... seeking help and fellowship? Was I seeking some intimacy with beauty? It was a thing too formless to state, that I seemed always desiring to attain and never attaining. Waves of gross sensuousness arose out of this preoccupation, carried me to a crisis of gratification or disappointment that was clearly not the needed thing; they passed and left my mind free again for a time to get on with the permanent pursuits of my life. And then presently this solicitude would have me again, an irrelevance as it seemed, and ...
— The New Machiavelli • Herbert George Wells

... again resumed, when Brother Macnamara rose to his feet and, in a speech incoherent at times, but always forceful, proposed that the usual order be suspended and that here and now a motion be carried expressing their gratification at the recent great hockey victory and referring in highly laudatory terms to the splendid work of Brother Captain Maitland, to whose splendid efforts ...
— To Him That Hath - A Novel Of The West Of Today • Ralph Connor

... was brought in, which had been sent for by the bishop's permission. It was terribly out of tune, with half the strings broke; but we were determined to grudge no trouble in putting it in order, and giving these poor recluses what they considered so great a gratification. We got it into some sort of condition at last, and when they heard it played, they were vehement in their expressions of delight. The Seora ——-, who has a charming voice, afterwards sang to them, the bishop being very indulgent, ...
— Life in Mexico • Frances Calderon de la Barca

... Dramatic success. 'It is not,' she says, 'so delicious, so glorious, so complete a gratification as, in our secret longings, we all expect. It does not fill the heart,—it is an intoxication followed by a dismal reaction.' She tells a friend that never in all her life was she so depressed and out of spirits as after 'Rienzi,' her first really successful ...
— Our Village • Mary Russell Mitford

... showing, he was a most deliberate sinner, ready to sacrifice an innocent soul for his own gratification. Only ...
— Banked Fires • E. W. (Ethel Winifred) Savi

... snows only to do homage to my little Annie. As we enter among them the great elephant makes us a bow in the best style of elephantine courtesy, bending lowly down his mountain bulk, with trunk abased and leg thrust out behind. Annie returns the salute, much to the gratification of the elephant, who is certainly the best-bred monster in the caravan. The lion and the lioness are busy with two beef-bones. The royal tiger, the beautiful, the untamable, keeps pacing his narrow cage with a haughty step, unmindful of the spectators or recalling ...
— Twice Told Tales • Nathaniel Hawthorne

... whom Napoleon admitted were chiefly persons of rank and distinction, travellers from distant countries, or men who had distinguished themselves in the scientific world, and who could communicate interesting information in exchange for the gratification they received. Some of those persons who were admitted to interviews with him have published narratives of their conversation, and all agree in extolling the extreme grace, propriety, and appearance ...
— The Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte • Bourrienne, Constant, and Stewarton

... to multiply books, but to gather knowledge. The sages of the political millennium exhibited their stores of useful learning in a cabinet containing a few hundred volumes. All the lumber of letters had perished, or was preserved only in one or two public libraries for the gratification of a few harmless dreamers that were tolerated in their laborious idleness. This pleasant little picture, drawn by M. L. S. Mercier, of the state of things five centuries hence, is in strong contrast to the painful plethora of books of the present day. Dr. Ingleby, the famous Shakespearian ...
— The Book-Hunter in London - Historical and Other Studies of Collectors and Collecting • William Roberts

... publication of any book"; and, not least, "Live and let Live: or domestic service illustrated," of which Dr. Channing wrote, "I cannot, without violence to my feelings, refrain from expressing to you the great gratification with which I have read your 'Live and let Live.' Thousands will be better and happier for it.... Your three last books, I trust, form an era ...
— Daughters of the Puritans - A Group of Brief Biographies • Seth Curtis Beach

... their education, and her husband talks of throwing up his appointment before long, as he is anxious to go home while his father lives. I wish I had gone to Stoneborough before coming out here, now that I see what a gratification it would have been if I could have brought a fresh report of old Dr. May. (Somehow, I think there has been a numbness or obtuseness about me all these last two years which hindered me from perceiving or doing much that I now regret, since either the change or the wholesome atmosphere of this ...
— The Two Sides of the Shield • Charlotte M. Yonge

... who could be best assailed and suppressed by ridicule. They could be laughed and chaffed rather than reasoned out of existence. Certainly the paper was not established with any idea of profit, nor for the gratification of indulging in scurrilous personal attacks. It only dealt with public affairs and with men in their public capacity. Indeed, I may say that all the men connected with the Town Crier at its starting were ...
— A Tale of One City: The New Birmingham - Papers Reprinted from the "Midland Counties Herald" • Thomas Anderton

... (spiritual) river, by the side of the San Sheng (thrice-born) stone, a blade of the Chiang Chu (purple pearl) grass. At about the same time it was that the block of stone was, consequent upon its rejection by the goddess of works, also left to ramble and wander to its own gratification, and to roam about at pleasure to every and any place. One day it came within the precincts of the Ching Huan (Monitory Vision) Fairy; and this Fairy, cognizant of the fact that this stone had a history, detained it, therefore, to reside at the Ch'ih Hsia (purple clouds) palace, and apportioned ...
— Hung Lou Meng, Book I • Cao Xueqin

... matter over I must admit I am greatly perturbed. I am not like those women who glory in winning a man's love for the mere gratification of their vanity. I know myself how much one can suffer from unrequited affection, and I am steadily determined to cure Mr. Rawlings of his love-madness by every ...
— Our Elizabeth - A Humour Novel • Florence A. Kilpatrick

... little piece of rose-geranium from her flowers for the gratification of her own nose; and skipped away through the hall to rejoin her companions, ...
— The Wide, Wide World • Elizabeth Wetherell

... cried, "I AM punished for trifling with others. Here is a man who seeks me in my home for no other purpose than his own amusement and the gratification of his curiosity. He could not deny it when brought squarely to the issue. He could not look me in the eyes and say that he was my honest friend. He would flirt with me, if he could, to beguile his burdensome leisure; but when I defined ...
— An Original Belle • E. P. Roe

... the work of the past, and to that of the work of the present, largely explains the wastefulness of our civilization,—the reckless consumption by luxury of the labor of years in the pleasure of an hour,—the inhumanity of the thousands of unthinking rich, each of whom dissipates yearly in the gratification of totally unnecessary wants the price of a hundred human lives. The cannibals of civilization are unconsciously more cruel than those of savagery, and require much more flesh. The deeper humanity,—the ...
— Kokoro - Japanese Inner Life Hints • Lafcadio Hearn

... might be passed; or too weary, or unwilling, to retread all his former steps. Who shall pretend to say, that this child, thus sitting, in a state of abstraction, by the side of an impassable piece of water, might not first feel that ardent thirst of nautical knowledge excited, the gratification of which has since led to such glorious consequences! Be this as it may—for even himself, if living, might not now be conscious of the fact—it is perfectly well remembered that, on his being brought into the presence of his grandmother, ...
— The Life of the Right Honourable Horatio Lord Viscount Nelson, Vol. I (of 2) • James Harrison

... started with a sledge party on the 21st, to proceed to the north-east, in the hopes of discovering Barrow's Straits; and, after travelling for upwards of seventy miles, they had the intense gratification, on the 26th of October, of pitching their tents on its shores. The next morning, before sunrise, he and Mr Court ascended a hill, 600 feet in height, whence they could command a view of forty or fifty miles over the Straits, though ...
— Our Sailors - Gallant Deeds of the British Navy during Victoria's Reign • W.H.G. Kingston

... as these that the adventurer has intervals of enjoyment which amply reward him for laborious days of hardship and privation. The sense of gratification and repose is intense in such extreme cases, and cannot be known to him whose life is counted out in a monotonous succession of hours of eating and sleeping within a house; whose food is adulterated by spices, and sauces, intolerable to real ...
— Three Expeditions into the Interior of Eastern Australia, Vol 1 (of 2) • Thomas Mitchell

... masses and placed in a vase by itself; for it needs no relief from other flowers, its own soft leaves afford background enough, and though the white variety rarely occurs, yet the varying tints of blue upon the same stalk are a perpetual gratification to the eye. I know not why shaded blues should be so beautiful in flowers, and yet avoided as distasteful in ladies' fancy-work; but it is a mystery like that which repudiates blue-and-green from all well-regulated costumes, while Nature yet ...
— Atlantic Monthly, Vol. 10, No. 62, December, 1862 • Various

... indulging in "spasms of laughter." But their distant cousin, the hyena, does laugh aloud, and its laughter agrees with that of the dog and with the laughter of children and grown men in simpler moods in that it is caused by the pleasurable emotion set up by the imminent gratification of a healthy desire. The hyena laughs, the dog grins and bounds, the child laughs and jumps for joy at the approach of something good to eat. But it is a curious fact that the whole attitude is changed when the food is within reach, and the serious business of consuming it has commenced! ...
— More Science From an Easy Chair • Sir E. Ray (Edwin Ray) Lankester

... her maid began taking the hairpins out of her hair, she told herself with a feeling of gratification that this had been one of the pleasantest Christmas days she had ever spent. Everything had gone off so well, and she could see that Varick had enjoyed every moment of it, from his surprise distribution of little gifts to his guests at breakfast, ...
— From Out the Vasty Deep • Mrs. Belloc Lowndes

... Judge Whittaker, who seldom leaves his home at night, was on the platform, and at the close of the valedictory, which was given by Leonidas Burbridge, of Greenville, Miss., he jumped from his chair, seized the young man by the hand and expressed his wonder and gratification at all he had heard and seen, saying that in all his fifty years of life in New Orleans he had seen nothing that so filled his heart with emotions ...
— The American Missionary, Vol. 43, No. 8, August, 1889 • Various

... is not often I get a chance to read much periodical literature, but I have just gone through at this belated period, with much gratification and edification, your ...
— Mark Twain, A Biography, 1835-1910, Complete - The Personal And Literary Life Of Samuel Langhorne Clemens • Albert Bigelow Paine

... with such charm that his son acquired an unusual fondness for anecdotes, which he indulges extensively in some of his writings, particularly the autobiographical works and books of travel. The problem of making both ends meet seems to have occupied the father less than the gratification of his "noble passions," chief among which was card playing. He gambled away so much money that in eight years he was forced to sell his business and move to other parts. He purposely continued the search for a new business as long as possible, but finally bought ...
— The German Classics Of The Nineteenth And Twentieth Centuries, Volume 12 • Various

... hitherto been the Mumfords' wont to dress for dinner, but this evening they did so, and obviously to Miss Derrick's gratification. She herself appeared in a dress which altogether outshone that of her hostess. Afterwards, in private, she drew Emmeline's attention to this garb, and frankly asked her opinion ...
— The Paying Guest • George Gissing

... your letter and communication for the governor of the state were both read and afforded much gratification. Thanks were voted to the liberal donor the marquis de Pastoret for his present of books, "Histoire de la legislation des peuples". The society feel greatly indebted to you for the interest you have exhibited ...
— Movement of the International Literary Exchanges, between France and North America from January 1845 to May, 1846 • Various

... high gratification of hearing the address, we take pleasure, in accordance with the second of the concurrent resolutions, in requesting you to furnish a copy of the address ...
— Memorial Address on the Life and Character of Abraham Lincoln - Delivered at the request of both Houses of Congress of America • George Bancroft

... lighted the gas, which disclosed a small yellow boy, standing in the doorway, some fright and a good deal of excitement in his aspect. I then detected that he had something important to tell, and that his errand was a source of gratification ...
— Stories by American Authors, Volume 6 • Various

... contented without improvement, but upon the whole the history of Europe has been the history of kings, queens, princes, and nobility, and wars for national aggrandizement, increased territory, or the gratification of the whims of the dominant classes. The laborer has endured the toil, fought the battles, and paid the taxes. Here we find the introduction of machinery, which in the long run will make the world more prosperous, ...
— History of Human Society • Frank W. Blackmar

... keen eye for the foibles of others, and loved to communicate his discoveries. He had some talent for sarcasm, and considerable skill in detecting the sore places where sarcasm would be most acutely felt. His vanity, as well as his malignity, found gratification in the vexation and confusion of those who smarted under his caustic jests. Yet in truth his success on these occasions belonged quite as much to the king as to the wit. We read that Commodus descended, sword in hand, into the arena, against ...
— Critical and Historical Essays Volume 2 • Thomas Babington Macaulay

... approved of the size of each, calculating that there would be enough for all, no matter how insatiable the appetites. They took their forks in hand as a warrior would his spear, and the landlady had the gratification of seeing that city delicacies had not depreciated her humble country food in the ...
— Pixy's Holiday Journey • George Lang

... in surprise and gratification, and shaking his hand warmly) Then you're on our side! You'll help ...
— King Arthur's Socks and Other Village Plays • Floyd Dell

... history. I suffered—I was wronged—I was revenged. But was I happy? I sought happiness. All men do so, even the most miserable. Some seek happiness in gratified ambition, some in gratified avarice, some in gratified vanity, and some in the gratification of a dominant lust for pleasure or for power. I ...
— Edmond Dantes • Edmund Flagg

... slaveholder may allow himself to act toward his slave, and, whatever cruelty he may deem it wise, for example's sake, or for the gratification of his humor, to inflict, he cannot, in the absence of all provocation, look with pleasure upon the bleeding wounds of a defenseless slave-woman. When he drives her from his presence without redress, or ...
— My Bondage and My Freedom • Frederick Douglass

... nerves of my spirit felt the chill of its remoteness. And even when I waked again, I could not be sure that I was Montagu Lane, an idle young man of the twentieth century, who had come for the gratification of a whim to this fastness where greater men had ventured in peril ...
— The Princess Passes • Alice Muriel Williamson and Charles Norris Williamson

... one woman at the expense of another, I do not know it. And without entering any defense for the men who love several women at one time, I wish to make a clear distinction between the men who bully and brutalize women for their own gratification and the men who find their highest pleasure in pleasing women. The latter may not be a paragon, yet as his desire is to give pleasure, not to corral it, he is a totally different being from the man who deceives, badgers, humiliates, ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great, Vol. 2 of 14 - Little Journeys To the Homes of Famous Women • Elbert Hubbard

... be proud of, and Tony was justly and pardonably proud. It was at least a gratification next morning to see not only that the school generally took unabated interest in the Dominican, but that he had fairly astonished his own class-fellows. Their admiration of the editor was unbounded and undisguised. ...
— The Fifth Form at Saint Dominic's - A School Story • Talbot Baines Reed

... occasion you wish to be informed, "What boots it, that you idly dream?" Nothing boots it at present—a fact, sir, which ought to afford you the highest gratification. ...
— Literary Lapses • Stephen Leacock

... being a modest boy, blushed as he saw his picture staring at him from the front page, labeled underneath "The Heroic Telegraph Boy." He read the account, which was quite correctly written with a mixture of emotions, among which gratification predominated. ...
— Mark Mason's Victory • Horatio Alger

... moral discipline to which ordinary mortals, who act in the presence of their equals, are so happily subjected. That the loss of Silesia should never be forgotten—the King of Prussia never forgiven—that his total destruction would have been the highest gratification to her, cannot be objects of surprise. The mixed character of human nature seldom affords, when all its propensities are drawn out by circumstances, any proper theme for the entire and unqualified praises of a moralist; but everything is pardoned to Maria Theresa, when she is compared, as ...
— The Great Events by Famous Historians, v. 13 • Various

... keep them for the rest of his life, to show how his labours had been rewarded.[602] The event—which always justifies true manliness—proved the sagacity of this proud demeanour. Fonseca was baulked of his gratification. The clumsy Bobadilla had overdone the business. The sight of the Admiral's stately and venerable figure in chains, as he passed through the streets of Cadiz, on a December day of that year 1500, awakened a popular outburst of sympathy for him and indignation at his persecutors. ...
— The Discovery of America Vol. 1 (of 2) - with some account of Ancient America and the Spanish Conquest • John Fiske

... whose careers were by no means above suspicion. I had crossed with them to England, and if their presence on the train were not the cause for Louis' insisting upon my hurried departure from Paris, it at any rate afforded him gratification to think that I might, perhaps, make their acquaintance. During the whole of the journey neither of them had made the slightest overture towards me. That we had come together at all was, without doubt, accidental. ...
— The Lost Ambassador - The Search For The Missing Delora • E. Phillips Oppenheim

... happened to please Sen," cried the sister, her own mouth on a broad grin, in her expectation of coming in for a share of the gratification. "I wish you would get him to tell us what it is, Mary; he'll tell ...
— The Redskins; or, Indian and Injin, Volume 1. - Being the Conclusion of the Littlepage Manuscripts • James Fenimore Cooper

... Mrs. Strickland, sister of Charles Townley, Esq., whose very noble collection of pictures is not more to be admired, than his extraordinary and polite readiness in shewing it, which I and several of my friends have agreeably experienced. They who are possessed of valuable stores of gratification to persons of taste, should exercise their benevolence in imparting the pleasure. Grateful acknowledgments are due to Welbore Ellis Agar, Esq., for the liberal access which he is pleased to allow to his exquisite collection of ...
— The Life Of Johnson, Volume 3 of 6 • Boswell

... indicative and subjunctive forms: 'I may go,' 'if I may go.' And further, we might proceed to constitute other moods on the same analogy, as, for example, an obligatory mood—'I must go,' or 'I ought to go'; a mood of resolution—'I will go, you shall go'; a mood of gratification—'I am delighted to go'; of deprecation—'I am grieved to go.' The only difference in the two last instances is the use of the sign of the infinitive 'to,' which does not occur after 'may,' 'can,' 'must,' 'ought,' etc.; but that is not an ...
— The Verbalist • Thomas Embly Osmun, (AKA Alfred Ayres)

... soul, to the despotic tyranny of some favorite pursuit. For man's natural longing after the infinite, even when showing itself in his passions and feelings, cannot, where genuine, be satisfied with any earthly object or sensual gratification or external possession. When, however, this pursuit, keeping itself free from all delusions of sense, really directs its endeavor toward the infinite, and only to what is truly such, it can never rest or be stationary. Ever advancing, step by ...
— The Continental Monthly, Vol. 6, No 4, October, 1864 - Devoted To Literature And National Policy • Various

... later Colonel Grim received an appointment at the fortress of Aggershuus, and immediately took up his residence in the capital. He saw that his son cut a fine figure in the highest circles of society, and expressed his gratification in the most emphatic terms. If he had known, however, that Ralph was in the habit of visiting, with alarming regularity, at the house of a plebeian merchant in a somewhat obscure street, he would, no doubt, have been more chary of his praise. But the Colonel suspected ...
— Short Story Classics (American) Vol. 2 • Various

... in good faith, or could fulfill at once the obligations which such a reconciliation would have imposed upon them, as matter of honor, in all their civil and political relations. The reaction involved in passing from a state of hostilities to a state of peace, the deep gratification of seeing so mortal a struggle determined in favor of the national life, may have carried him somewhat beyond the limitations set by the hard facts of the case, and by the human nature alike of the excited conquerors and ...
— Abraham Lincoln, Vol. II • John T. Morse

... going to play the king in Macbeth, and Banquo's ghost was arising; and he turned his glossy locks into a cadaverous and premature grayness, and Bess didn't like it. She wanted to see him only one Sunday in "his best shuit"; but Jem, unkind fellow, would not grant her that gratification. ...
— My New Curate • P.A. Sheehan

... the advantages which the Company may receive from the appointment of such minister will depend on his readiness to promote our views and advance our interest, we are willing to allow him so liberal a gratification as may excite his zeal and secure his attachment to the Company; we therefore empower you to grant to the person whom you shall think worthy of this trust an annual allowance not exceeding three lacs of rupees, (thirty thousand pounds,) ...
— The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. XII. (of XII.) • Edmund Burke

... of fashion knew at what cost some of their imaginary wants are gratified, it is possible that they might be disposed to forego the gratification: it is possible, also, that they might not. On the one hand they are not wanting in benevolence to the young and beautiful; the juster charge against them being, that their benevolence extends no farther. On the other hand, unless there be a visual perception of the youth and beauty ...
— The Mirror of Literature, Amusement, and Instruction, Vol. 20, No. 577 - Volume 20, Number 577, Saturday, November 24, 1832 • Various

... she must be kept very, very quiet," was the gently spoken reply. "I know it would be a joy to both you and her to meet and exchange a few words, but it might be a risk for her; and I know you would far rather deny yourselves the gratification than do anything to increase her suffering; to say nothing of ...
— Elsie's Vacation and After Events • Martha Finley

... advantageous Creole marriages. Love, too, sheer uncalculating love, impelled not a few Whites to enter the hymeneal state with the dusky captivators of their affections. When rich, the white planter not seldom paid for such gratification of his laudable impulse by accepting exclusion from "Society"—and when poor, he incurred almost invariably his dismissal from employment. Of course, in all cases of the sort the dispensers of such penalties were actuated by high motives ...
— West Indian Fables by James Anthony Froude Explained by J. J. Thomas • J. J. (John Jacob) Thomas

... accordance with the program. It was fortunate, however, for the kidnappers, that the young Prince proved favorably disposed to the plan. He accepted the invitation of his captors with alacrity. He even wrote to thank the governor for his friendly offices in his behalf. He received with boyish gratification the festivities with which Lodron enlivened his brief sojourn at Antwerp, and he set forth without reluctance for that gloomy and terrible land of Spain, whence so rarely a Flemish traveller had returned. A changeling, as it were, from ...
— The Rise of the Dutch Republic, 1555-1566 • John Lothrop Motley

... but a sort of comfort-grinding machine. According to them, the improvement of natural knowledge always has been, and always must be, synonymous with no more than the improvement of the material resources and the increase of the gratification of men. ...
— Lectures and Essays • T.H. Huxley

... other objects happen to every one of us every day in the year, only we don't look at and examine them; nor, if we did, could we reconcile them to any theory of the mind—all that we can say being, that if we love a certain object, we hate any other which comes between us and our gratification; and thus, just as Mr. Thomas Dodds loved Mrs. Mary Blyth, so in an equal ratio he hated his good helpmate Jenny. And then began that other wonderful process called reconciliation, whereby the wish gradually overcomes scruples through the cunning mean of falsifying their aspects. Whereunto, again, ...
— Wilson's Tales of the Borders and of Scotland, Vol. XXIII. • Various

... discomfiture he found himself frequently inattentive. Several important cases were pending, and in a day or two they were to go into court with a damage suit of more than ordinary consequence. Lorry, senior, could not repress his gratification over the return of his clever, active nephew at such an opportune time. He had felt himself unable to handle the case alone; the endurance of a young and vigorous mind was required for the coming battle ...
— Graustark • George Barr McCutcheon

... were too large an adversary. Great as was the pleasure of being present on an occasion so admirably organised, of sitting there in a beautiful room, in a still, attentive, brilliant company, with all the questions of temperature, space, light and decoration solved to the gratification of every sense, and listening to the best artists doing their best—happily constituted as our young man was to enjoy such a privilege as this, the total effect was depressing: it made him feel as if the gods were not ...
— A London Life; The Patagonia; The Liar; Mrs. Temperly • Henry James

... acrobats, and songs, and story-telling whenever there was room for a crowd to gather. Faquirs as gruesome and fantastic as the side-shows at a Western fair flocked in to pose and be gaped at, receiving, besides free rations and tribute of small coin, gratification to their vanity in return for the ...
— Guns of the Gods • Talbot Mundy

... some vague way, the clean-cut face was familiar. His curiosity thus aroused, he perceived the tenseness of expression and attitude, and shrewdly suspected the truth. It was with benevolent intent, rather than for the gratification of inquisitiveness, that he finally got up and seated himself in the vacant place alongside ...
— Heart of the Blue Ridge • Waldron Baily

... House," was the mild answer to a question that so startled everybody else as to cause one man to jump up and cry, "Fire!" very much to the gratification of his fellow-passengers. There is nothing more pleasing to human beings than to see somebody else make himself ridiculous, and the amusement extracted from the contemplation of that car-load of men and women almost compensated me for ...
— The Wit and Humor of America, Volume V. (of X.) • Various

... conscious of a gnawing pain at his heart. He retreated as he had come. There are disappointments which wring us, and there are those which inflict a wound whose mark we bear to our graves. Such are so keen that no future gratification of the same desire can ever obliterate them: they become registered as a permanent loss of happiness. Such a one was Stephen's now: the crowning aureola of the dream had been the meeting here by stealth; and if Elfride had come to ...
— A Pair of Blue Eyes • Thomas Hardy

... race (not alone giving birth to fit children, but the equally necessary work of both parents uniting in caring for and bringing them up) can be left safely to be confused and wasted by its dependence on the gratification of personal desires. I wish that I thought otherwise. It would make it all so much easier. It is useless to point back here to the action of love's selection in the past history of life. As civilisation progresses, and as individual needs become elaborated and wealth ...
— The Truth About Woman • C. Gasquoine Hartley

... he had fallen towards God. {63a} He is represented as being so much engrossed with the vanities and amusements of the world as to prefer his own pleasure and advantage to the good of a religious community or the pious gratification of his sister. It was only by some miracle that it could be otherwise; and there was no reason to “expect a miracle of grace in a person like him.” {63b} All the means at his command were hardly sufficient to enable him to live ...
— Pascal • John Tulloch

... dramatist, felt themselves attracted to the great Indian Scientist and came to pay their homage to him. Even Lord Crewe, the then Secretary of State for India, paid a visit to his laboratory and spoke warmly of the pride which he and the Government of India felt for his discoveries and of high gratification to him that India should once more make such contributions for the intellectual advancement of the world. The leading newspapers wrote eulogistically of his researches. The well-known scientific journal Nature devoted ten columns to an illustrated synopsis of his discoveries. Lord Hardinge, ...
— Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose - His Life and Speeches • Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose

... his direction, and showed her the city much as he might have led her over his silk-mill in Manchester. Unimbued with history and literature, he knew nothing of the scholar's or the poet's enthusiasm; his gratification lay in exercising his solid intelligence on a lot of strange and often grotesque facts. Here men had lived two thousand years ago. There was no mistake about it; you saw the deep ruts of their wheels along ...
— The Emancipated • George Gissing

... Charlottenburg, did not escape this mania of destruction. This collection, containing among other things the most beautiful Greek statues, had been purchased in Rome by Gotzkowsky, and had afforded the king peculiar gratification, and was a source of much enjoyment to him. In the eyes of some Saxon officers, to whom this fact was known, it was sufficient reason for its condemnation. They themselves led the most violent and destructive ...
— The Merchant of Berlin - An Historical Novel • L. Muhlbach

... preeminently worship Kali, the goddess of blood, and the other consorts of Siva. It is a worship of power ("Sakti" means energy or power), and usually power of the maleficent type. It is perhaps the lowest form of Hinduism and easily lends itself to a gratification of the lowest passions of men. This tantric cult (the tantras are the sacred books of the Saktar) is the only one in modern Hinduism which indulges in bloody sacrifices—Kali and her sisters being satisfied ...
— India's Problem Krishna or Christ • John P. Jones

... three girls, and a baby. They had all been killed by white men, who had probably met the innocent creatures somewhere near the blockhouse, driven them from the road into the timber, where the cruel murders were committed without provocation, and for no other purpose than the gratification of the inordinate hatred of the Indian that has often existed on the frontier, and which on more than one occasion has failed to distinguish friend from foe. The bodies lay in a semicircle, and the bits of rope with which the poor wretches had been strangled ...
— The Memoirs of General Philip H. Sheridan, Vol. I., Part 1 • Philip H. Sheridan

... which set out immediately. The rowers, knowing they had the honor of conveying the surintendant of the finances, pulled with all their strength, and that magic word, the finances, promised them a liberal gratification, of which they wished to prove themselves worthy. The lighter bounded over the tiny waves of the Loire. Magnificent weather, one of those sun risings that empurple landscapes, left the river all its limpid serenity. ...
— The Vicomte de Bragelonne - Or Ten Years Later being the completion of "The Three - Musketeers" And "Twenty Years After" • Alexandre Dumas

... final word on any topic. The gentle reader has certain rights, and among these is the privilege of summing up the case. But the fact holds that world-pain is a form of desire. All desires are just, proper and right; and their gratification is the means by which Nature supplies us that which we need. Desire not only causes us to seek that which we need, but is a form of attraction by which the good is brought to us, just as the ameba creates ...
— Little Journeys to the Homes of the Great - Volume 14 - Little Journeys to the Homes of Great Musicians • Elbert Hubbard

... three-cornered hat cocked proudly on his head, and a small sword by his side. He had grown heavier, and Henry saw that the face had increased much in coarseness and cruelty. It had also increased in satisfaction. He was a great man now, as he saw great men, and both face and figure radiated gratification and pride as he lolled before the fire. At the other corner, sitting upon the floor and also in a Loyalist uniform, was his lieutenant, Levi Coleman, older, heavier, and with a short, uncommonly muscular figure. His face was dark and cruel, with ...
— The Scouts of the Valley • Joseph A. Altsheler

... in Europe. The moose is, perhaps, of a new class. I wish these spoils, Sir, may have the merit of adding anything new to the treasures of nature, which have so fortunately come under your observation, and of which she seems to have given you the key: they will in that case be some gratification to you, which it will always be pleasing to me to have procured; having the honor to be, with sentiments of the most perfect esteem and respect, Sir, your most obedient, and most ...
— The Writings of Thomas Jefferson - Library Edition - Vol. 6 (of 20) • Thomas Jefferson

... was turned low, so that there was not much light coming through the skylight. But when the old fellow fell into step by my side, and began to talk quite rationally about the heat below, the impossibility of sleeping, and his gratification at the fine breeze which we had fallen in with, and so on, I was completely thrown off my guard; for he appeared to be in precisely the condition that I had often previously seen him in, when he had talked rationally enough for a time, taken a little walk—as he was doing at that moment—and then, ...
— Turned Adrift • Harry Collingwood

... a turn to the conversation which placed his own interests more in collision with the gratification of his present passion than he ...
— Woodstock; or, The Cavalier • Sir Walter Scott

... hastily emitting a hiss which must have cost him a heartrending effort, relegated the greatly relieved Dolly to the ranks, and smoothed over the situation by "choosing" my daughter, to that young person's undisguised gratification. ...
— The Right Stuff - Some Episodes in the Career of a North Briton • Ian Hay

... a thirsty look which she seemed to be trying to suppress, for she was glancing about the room with an expression of prudence as if she were reminding herself that not lightly must she run the risk of being evicted from this comfort. But the thirst triumphed. She gave herself the gratification she had desired, and turned on Ellen eyes on whose dull darkness there floated like oil a glistening look of lewd accusation. It took the form of a wet, twitching smile. But behind it was every sort of beaten, desolate envy: the envy of the happy which is felt by the ...
— The Judge • Rebecca West

... body and the vital body we also have a body made of desire stuff from which we form our feelings and emotions. This vehicle also impels us to seek sense gratification. But while the two instruments of which we have already spoken, are well organized, the desire body appears to spiritual sight as an ovoid cloud extending from sixteen to twenty inches beyond the physical body. It is above the head and below the feet so that our ...
— The Rosicrucian Mysteries • Max Heindel

... probability, in that the words were not addressed directly to them, so that there was none of that irritation which often results when one feels himself being "preached at." Hendrick was now a weekly visitor at Mrs. McAravey's cottage, and he had at length the gratification of seeing, in this one home at least, the results of his long-continued and faithful labours. At his suggestion, Jim, who, especially after the old man's death, could be made nothing of at home, was sent to a distant relative in Coleraine, where he had an ...
— A Child of the Glens - or, Elsie's Fortune • Edward Newenham Hoare

... me a gratification, beyond what I can communicate by letter, to lend you a helping hand in the labour of love you are engaged in, and I shall esteem it a very great privilege being allowed to exercise my abilities as an architect and surveyor in the erection ...
— A Narrative of Some of the Lord's Dealings with George Mueller - Written by Himself, Fourth Part • George Mueller

... or else go to church, and not stroll up and down the streets." The transports, consisting of about forty sloops and schooners, lay at Long Wharf; and here on Monday a grand review took place,—to the gratification, no doubt, of a populace whose amusements were few. All was ready except the muskets, which were expected from England, but did not come. Hence the delay of a month, threatening to ruin the enterprise. When Shirley returned from Alexandria he ...
— Montcalm and Wolfe • Francis Parkman

... myself, there is nothing I should not consider myself to have attained either by the congratulation contained in your letter, or the testimony borne to me in your senatorial speech: and it was at once the highest compliment and the greatest gratification to me, that you willingly conceded to friendship, what you transparently conceded to truth. And if, I don't say all, but if many were Catos in our state—in which it is a matter of wonder that there is even one—what ...
— Letters of Cicero • Marcus Tullius Cicero

... certain, or probable, or possible only, and they will abundantly vindicate the position that our conduct now and here should be regulated to some extent by a regard to what may be before us. In both cases alike, present gratification must give place to future safety, and self-denial, according to the shrewd remark of Franklin, is neither more nor less in the case of a prudent man than self-owning, the recognition of his own dignity, and the preference of a greater and more permanent to ...
— Modern Atheism under its forms of Pantheism, Materialism, Secularism, Development, and Natural Laws • James Buchanan

... took Marble below, and related to him all that had occurred since the separation. He listened with the deepest interest, manifesting the strongest sympathy in our success. Nothing but expressions of gratification escaped him, until I remarked, as I ...
— Afloat And Ashore • James Fenimore Cooper

... things of this life while you may." Putting the emphasis there is likely to warp one's judgment as to what are really "the good things," and so it proved in B——'s case, for he spent his salary on luxuries, and for the temporary gratification of his appetite and his ideas of "a ...
— "Say Fellows—" - Fifty Practical Talks with Boys on Life's Big Issues • Wade C. Smith

... certain of that, at any rate," laughed Curtis. "He impressed me as weighing a hundred and ninety pounds or thereabouts, and, if it will afford you the slightest gratification, I'll take the first opportunity to work out the approximate force required to drive back a moving body of that weight while traveling forward, say, fifteen miles an hour. There are angles of resistance to be calculated, too, so it offers ...
— One Wonderful Night - A Romance of New York • Louis Tracy

... the king said, with a little groan, 'that this at least is no whim of Harelip's, but a matter of State policy. You are well aware that his gratification comes purely from the pleasure of sacrificing himself to ...
— The Princess and the Goblin • George MacDonald

... was rather bare of cultivation and of inhabitants, but the wealth and variety of flowers and shrubs more than made amends. Nowhere have I seen such numbers of flowering shrubs as all through this region, a few known to me, but most of them quite new. It was with much gratification that I learned at a later time of the remarkable work done in connection with the Arnold Arboretum near Boston in seeking out and bringing to America specimens of many of China's beautiful trees and plants. At the head of one small valley we passed a charming temple half buried ...
— A Wayfarer in China - Impressions of a trip across West China and Mongolia • Elizabeth Kendall

... neighbourhood of Pretoria, the Professor had been through most phases of the showman's business in South Africa and, during the past half-dozen years, in Australia. In one sense he was a cruel man; but in the worst possible sense of the word he was not cruel. That is to say, it gave him no particular gratification to inflict pain; but he would inflict it to any extent at all, in the pursuit of his ends. He was not afflicted with the loathsome disease of wanton cruelty, but there was no pity in his composition, ...
— Finn The Wolfhound • A. J. Dawson

... as to what was left unprinted, and there was therefore a general feeling of gratification when it was announced some eighteen years ago that a new edition was to be published by the Rev. Mynors Bright, with the addition of new matter equal to a third of the whole. It was understood that at last the Diary ...
— Diary of Samuel Pepys, Complete • Samuel Pepys

... enemy. The whole community laughed, and the Post left me studiously alone until the new editor came and relieved me. I had lots of fun out of the experiment, besides getting the magnificent compensation of twenty dollars a week for my services. I also had the gratification of knowing that the exciting question of "Who edits the Appeal?" remained unanswered ...
— The History of Minnesota and Tales of the Frontier • Charles E. Flandrau

... the family at Cross Hall were in great perturbation. In the first place it had been now settled that they were to go back to the great house early in July. This might have been a source of unalloyed gratification. The old Marchioness had been made very unhappy by the change to Cross Hall, and had persisted in calling her new home a wretched farmhouse. Both Lady Susanna and Lady Amelia were quite alive to the advantages of the ...
— Is He Popenjoy? • Anthony Trollope

... abandoned waggon, with a team of Indian mules, affording a proper means of transport. Not without regret did we part with the friendly Mexican trapper, and our brave associates, the ex-rifleman and ex-infantry. We had afterwards the gratification to learn that the scalpless man survived his terrible mutilation; that under the protection of Peg-leg, he and Sure-shot were taken to the valley of Taos—whence, along with the next migration of "diggers," ...
— The Wild Huntress - Love in the Wilderness • Mayne Reid

... more before her, and oh! the nearness of Death had taught her the unspeakable value of that one asset on which we can rely—Life. Not, indeed, that life for which so many live—the life led for self, and having for its principle, if not its only end, the gratification of the desires of self; but an altogether higher life—a life devoted to telling that which her keen instinct knew was truth, and, however imperfectly, painting with the pigment of her noble art those visions of beauty which sometimes seemed ...
— Mr. Meeson's Will • H. Rider Haggard

... to pinch the much enduring little nose; but, as if the words reminded him of something, he gave her a kiss instead, a piece of forbearance which almost took Maud's breath away with surprise and gratification. ...
— An Old-fashioned Girl • Louisa May Alcott

... greatly to their surprise and gratification, that Jupp's well-built fire had not gone out, as all expected, during the unforeseen digression that had occurred to break the even tenor of their afternoon's entertainment, although left ...
— Teddy - The Story of a Little Pickle • J. C. Hutcheson

... announced. I desired him to be shewn in, and he made his appearance accompanied my Monsignor Cornaro, whom I feigned not to know. M. Orsi remarked that he had called to offer me his services for my letters of exchange, and introduced the prelate. I rose and expressed my gratification at making his acquaintance. "But we have met before," he replied, "at Venice and Rome." Assuming an air of blank surprise, I told him he must certainly be mistaken. The prelate, thinking he could guess the reason of ...
— The Memoires of Casanova, Complete • Jacques Casanova de Seingalt

... who, I understand, lived only for himself and for his personal gratification," Mrs. Howard ...
— The Man and the Moment • Elinor Glyn

... always in every situation remembered that there was Connie—and in order to insure her present comfort as well as to provide for her future livelihood, he had contrived to limit his expenses to the merest necessities. One only gratification he had allowed himself—his eyes travelled gloomily round his precious book-lined walls and he found himself wondering if those particular treasures would bring their full value in the open market? He ...
— The Wheel of Life • Ellen Anderson Gholson Glasgow

... back on the ground beside the fire. The glow fell squarely over his features, relaxed and softened now. He looked very hopefully and comfortingly young. There was a big, shy gratification on his face. ...
— Sally of Missouri • R. E. Young

... trip of the battle-ship "Massachusetts," which occurred in 1896, was a source of gratification to the Navy Department and to all others who are anxious to see the United States take respectable rank among the naval powers. The primary business of a battle-ship is to fight; hence her guns and not ...
— The Naval History of the United States - Volume 2 (of 2) • Willis J. Abbot

... especially, Marie Antoinette and The Historic Thames in a lesser degree, bear witness to this, which, in a don, we should call minute and painstaking research, but which in our subject we guess to be the gratification of a desire. ...
— Hilaire Belloc - The Man and His Work • C. Creighton Mandell



Words linked to "Gratification" :   pleasing, comfort, satisfaction, pampering, quality of life, emotional state, self-gratification, gratify, satiation, spirit, head trip, indulgence, humoring



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