All 9 Uses

motive
in
The Border Legion
(Auto-generated)

She had lived with rough men long enough to know he had no motive—no thought at all.†
Chpt 3

motive = reason (for doing something)
But had that been the spring of his motive?†
Chpt 3
It occurred to her how seldom she carried that bag on her saddle, and, thinking back, referred the fact to accident, and then with honest amusement owned that the motive might have been also a little vanity.†
Chpt 4
If she could only hide her terror, her abhorrence, her knowledge of him and his motive!†
Chpt 4
But his men never dreamed his motive.†
Chpt 8
Joan's intuition convinced her that if Gulden had any motive at all in gambling it was only an antagonism to men of his breed.†
Chpt 11 *
Joan, his motive is plain.†
Chpt 14
And Kells, more for advertisement than for any other motive, had his men stake out a number of claims near Cleve's, and bought them.†
Chpt 14
It was a tune when a horde of men from every class and nation, of all ages and characters, met on a field were motives and ambitions and faiths and traits merged into one mad instinct of gain.†
Chpt 14

motives = reasons for doing something

Definitions:

(1) (motive as in: What is her motive?)
a reason for doing something
(2) (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.