5 uses
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1 —2 uses as in:
What is her motive?
Definition
a reason for doing something
- His motives and intentions, however are a mystery to me.Chapter 14 — Phoebe's Good-Bye (62% in)
- ...after all, are about as honest as nine people in ten, except that they disregard certain formalities, and prefer to transact business at midnight rather than 'Change-hours,—and for these murderers, as you phrase it, who are often excusable in the motives of their deed, and deserve to be ranked among public benefactors, if we consider only its result,—for unfortunate individuals like these, I really cannot applaud the enlistment of an immaterial and miraculous power in the universal...Chapter 17 — The Flight of Two Owls (86% in)
There are no more uses of "motive" flagged with this meaning in The House of the Seven Gables.
Typical Usage
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? —3 uses
exact meaning not specified
- There was, at least, an assignable motive for the first stipulation; there appeared to be none whatever for the last.Chapter 13 — Alice Pyncheon (57% in)
- Hepzibah bade her young guest sit down, and, herself taking a chair near by, looked as earnestly at Phoebe's trim little figure as if she expected to see right into its springs and motive secrets.Chapter 5 — May and November (22% in)
- Each time, the delay seemed to be without purpose, but rather from a forgetfulness of the purpose which had set him in motion, or as if the person's feet came involuntarily to a stand-still because the motive-power was too feeble to sustain his progress.Chapter 7 — The Guest (32% in)
There are no more uses of "motive" in The House of the Seven Gables.
Typical Usage
(best examples)