Definitions
from The Century Dictionary.
- noun A private end; a secret purpose or design.
- noun An incidental or subsidiary aim or object.
from the GNU version of the Collaborative International Dictionary of English.
- noun Private end or interest; secret purpose; selfish advantage.
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.
- noun A
private end orambition ; asecret purpose ordesign ;hidden agenda . - noun An
incidental orsubsidiary aim orobjective .
Etymologies
from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License
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Examples
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English wealth, falling on their school and university training, makes a systematic reading of the best authors, and to the end of a knowledge how the things whereof they treat really stand: whilst pamphleteer or journalist reading for an argument for a party, or reading to write, or, at all events, for some by-end imposed on them, must read meanly and fragmentarily.
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A stanza of the song of nature the Oxonian has no ear for, and he does not value the salient and curative influence of intellectual action, studious of truth, without a by-end.
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A stanza of the song of nature the Oxonian has no ear for, and he does not value the salient and curative influence of intellectual action, studious of truth, without a by-end.
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English wealth falling on their school and university training, makes a systematic reading of the best authors, and to the end of a knowledge how the things whereof they treat really stand: whilst pamphleteer or journalist reading for an argument for a party, or reading to write, or, at all events, for some by-end imposed on them, must read meanly and fragmentarily.
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Love of the praise of men, as a by-end in that which is good, will make a man a hypocrite when religion is in fashion and credit is to be got by it; and love of the praise of men, as a base principle in that which is evil, will make a man an apostate when religion is in disgrace, and credit is to be lost for it, as here.
Commentary on the Whole Bible Volume V (Matthew to John) 1721
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Turn it from beholding vanity; let thy eye be single and not divided; let thy intentions be sincere and uniform, and look not asquint at any by-end.
Commentary on the Whole Bible Volume III (Job to Song of Solomon) 1721
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In every thing he did he meant well and had no by-end in view.
Commentary on the Whole Bible Volume III (Job to Song of Solomon) 1721
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I was not thinking of anything in particular; only there was a by-end of verse which sang itself over and over again, somewhere in the back of my brain -- "Her eyes were the eyes of a bride whom delight makes afraid, her eyes were the eyes of a bride" -- and so on, all over again, as at night a traveller may hear his train jogging through a monotonous and stiff-jointed song; and in my heart there was just hunger.
The Cords of Vanity A Comedy of Shirking James Branch Cabell 1918
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Christ _the end_ of your conversation, "and fear he is but a _by-end_ of mine.
A Brief Memoir with Portions of the Diary, Letters, and Other Remains, of Eliza Southall, Late of Birmingham, England Eliza Southall
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In the edition of _The Parish Clerk's Guide_ for 1731, the writer laments over the diminished status of his order, and states that "the clerk is oftentimes chosen rather for his poverty, to prevent a charge to the parish, than either for his virtue or skill; or else for some by-end or purpose, more than for the immediate Honour and Service of
The Parish Clerk 1892
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