All 50 Uses of
motive
in
Atlas Shrugged
- She was unable, then or since, to understand the motives of those who decided to build the line.†
Chpt 1.3motives = reasons for doing something
- Not to inquire about my aims, motives or desires is an essential part of their theory.†
Chpt 1.5
- My motives cannot interest you at present.†
Chpt 1.6
- There was no action she could take against the men of undefined thought, of unnamed motives, of unstated purposes, of unspecified morality.†
Chpt 1.10
- My motives were pure.†
Chpt 1.10
- They had not discussed that law, at their dinner together, or their motives or the risk they were taking.†
Chpt 2.2 *
- By the unwritten code of the day, nobody received or accepted an invitation from a man of public prominence except in token of one or the other of these motives.†
Chpt 2.2
- She watched the course of his struggle, whether by means of his steps, begun in one direction and swerving in another, or by means of her certainty that her body had become an instrument for the direct perception of his, like a screen reflecting both movements and motives-she could not tell.†
Chpt 3.2
- "I do not expect to be insulted by disloyal young punks with treasonable motives," said Dr. Stadler loudly.†
Chpt 3.3
- That's the difference between business and politics-we have no selfish ends in view, no private motives, we're not after profit, we don't spend our lives scrambling for money, we don't have to!†
Chpt 3.4
- It is your mind that they want you to surrender-all those who preach the creed of sacrifice, whatever their tags or their motives, whether they demand it for the sake of your soul or of your body, whether they promise you another life in heaven or a full stomach on this earth.†
Chpt 3.7
- The degree of your ability to live was the degree to which you broke your moral code, yet you believe that those who preach it are friends of humanity, you damn yourself and dare not question their motives or their goals.†
Chpt 3.7
- If, in the chaos of the motives that have made you listen to the radio tonight, there was an honest, rational desire to learn what is wrong with the world, you are the man whom I wished to address.†
Chpt 3.7
- Your destroyers hold you by means of your endurance, your generosity, your innocence, your love-the endurance that carries their burdens-the generosity that responds to their cries of despair-the innocence that is unable to conceive of their evil and gives them the benefit of every doubt, refusing to condemn them without understanding and incapable of understanding such motives as theirs-the love, your love of life, which makes you believe that they are men and that they love it, too.†
Chpt 3.7
- The notes flowed up, they spoke of rising and they were the rising itself, they were the essence and the form of upward motion, they seemed to embody every human act and thought that had ascent as its motive.†
Chpt 1.1
- Her motive, he thought, was a proudly indirect attempt to test his feeling and to confess her own.†
Chpt 1.2
- His motive in the relationship seemed to resemble the need of an anemic person who receives a kind of living transfusion from the mere sight of a savagely overabundant vitality.†
Chpt 1.2
- I am not collecting it for any personal motive.†
Chpt 1.2
- It was just ....You just happened to choose the one week when we had a little trouble with our motive power-our new engines are on order, but there's been a slight delay-you know what a problem we're having with the manufacturers of locomotives-but it's only temporary.†
Chpt 1.3
- Motive power —you can't imagine how important that is.†
Chpt 1.3
- Motive power-thought Dagny, looking up at the Taggart Building in the twilight-was its first need; motive power, to keep that building standing; movement, to keep it immovable.†
Chpt 1.4
- Motive power-thought Dagny, looking up at the Taggart Building in the twilight-was its first need; motive power, to keep that building standing; movement, to keep it immovable.†
Chpt 1.4
- She had always been-she closed her eyes with a faint smile of amusement and pain-the motive power of her own happiness.†
Chpt 1.4
- Some months ago, I instructed our Operating Department to cut the schedule on the San Sebastian Line down to a single train a day, and to remove from it our best motive power and rolling stock, as well as every piece of equipment that could be moved.†
Chpt 1.4
- "Let's find out" was the motive he gave to Dagny and Eddie for anything he undertook, or "Let's make it."†
Chpt 1.5
- They never had to explain the rest to each other; they knew each other's goal and motive.†
Chpt 1.5
- She felt pleasure in what she suddenly grasped about him, about herself and about his motive.†
Chpt 1.5
- He did not try to stop her; he leaned back, his elbows in the grass, and looked at her without moving; his glance seemed to say that he knew her motive.†
Chpt 1.5
- Can you think of a motive that would prompt me to do it?†
Chpt 1.5
- If you didn't want to make money, what possible motive could you have had?†
Chpt 1.5
- My motive, Dagny?†
Chpt 1.5
- He wondered why this was a motive that had no power to impel him.†
Chpt 1.6
- Only those whose motive is not money-making should be allowed to write.†
Chpt 1.6
- What's your motive?†
Chpt 1.6
- The man who sat in front of Rearden's desk had vague features and a manner devoid of all emphasis, so that one could form no specific image of his face nor detect the driving motive of his person.†
Chpt 1.7
- Dagny could not understand Mr. Mowen's motive.†
Chpt 1.7
- what motive moved them?†
Chpt 1.7
- She had wanted to see the outcome of the battle; now that he had won it-or lost-she was struck by the sudden, urgent need to know his identity and motive.†
Chpt 1.8
- The petition stated that its signers had no motive other than "a sense of civic duty."†
Chpt 1.8
- Another asked, "Aren't you going to tell us your motive for building that Line?†
Chpt 1.8
- That was my motive for building the Line.†
Chpt 1.8
- -I thought their real motive for inviting me was their appreciation of the Metal, and—" She smiled in the brief space of his pause; she knew the sentence he had stopped himself from uttering: " and for that, I would forgive anyone anything."†
Chpt 1.9
- And I couldn't figure out what their motive was.†
Chpt 1.9
- Dagny, I don't think they had any motive at all.†
Chpt 1.9
- And ...and of what use is a railroad without motive power?†
Chpt 1.9
- Dimly, she felt the chill of a thought telling her that self-interest was not Jim's motive.†
Chpt 1.10
- Now he wondered what motive could have made her so sensitive to a change in him-unless it was a feeling much greater than he had ever suspected her of experiencing.†
Chpt 1.10
- "Therefore, if you're thinking of your railroad, Miss Taggart-as, of course, you are, in view of certain possible developments-I must point out to you that although the welfare of the country is my first consideration, to which I would not hesitate to sacrifice anyone's profits, still, I have never closed my ears to a plea for mercy and—" She looked at him and understood what it was that he wanted from her, what sort of motive kept him going.†
Chpt 1.10
- No clue was ever found to Mulligan's motive, to his personal fate or to the many millions of his personal fortune.†
Chpt 1.10
- I have no special motive.†
Chpt 2.1
Definitions:
-
(1)
(motive as in: What is her motive?) a reason for doing something
-
(2)
(meaning too rare to warrant focus) meaning too rare to warrant focus:
Less commonly, motive can refer to something that causes motion in an inanimate object. Even less commonly, it can refer to a distinctive feature in music, art, or literature.