rapine

• “The number of prisoners or criminals would be inadequate to the annual demand; but the common people are in a state of servitude to their lords; the exercise of fraud or rapine is unpunished in a lawless community; and the market is continually replenished by the abuse of civil and paternal authority.”

  The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire

• “The king, while fully acknowledging Clive's services, thought him guilty of "rapine," and disapproved of his virtual acquittal.”

  The Political History of England - Vol. X. The History of England from the Accession of George III to the close of Pitt's first Administration

• “Eginhard's indignation at the "rapine" of this "nequissimus nebulo" is exquisitely droll.”

  Lectures and Essays

• “They come with the guilt of fresh sins warm upon their consciences, lifting up those hands in prayer that were lately busied in all kind of rapine and violence, and joining in it with those tongues that were not long before the instruments of railing, filth, and obscenity.”

  Sermons Preached Upon Several Occasions. Vol. VII.

• “His was the lean ship, and his the seven other lean ships that had made the foray, fled the rapine, and won through the storm.”

  Chapter 17

• “* One of ancient Rome's richest men, I discovered googling, was Marcus Linius Crassus, who achieved his wealth through 'fire and rapine.”

  The Huffington Post: Iris Erlingsdottir: Axing Art$ And Humanitie$

• “Thomas Asbridge opens his book The First Crusade (2004) with this quote from Pope Urban II: A race absolutely alien to God has invaded the land of Christians, has reduced the people with sword, rapine and flame.”

  Archive 2009-03-01

• “It's a one-book explanation for the current move to the left in a growing number of Latin American countries, tracing a centuries-long history of rapine and plunder, of genocide and dictatorship, first at the hands of Spain, and more recently under the baleful influence of the US, which operated directly or by proxy to ensure that nothing would ever change.”

  Archive 2009-04-01

• “If Cameron wanted realism, I suppose he could have instead depicted interminable sabotage, terrorism, and guerrilla warfare as the humans slowly but inevitably ate their way across the planet's surface, justifying the devastation by pointing out the brutality of their opponents while the Na'vi justified their brutality by pointing out the humans 'rapine use of resources and destruction of sacred sites.”

  Movie Review: Avatar

• “Oh, I have heard that figuration used in truly suspect ways, heard it used in the “rapine” sense, applied to some resource or other, and the phrase turned with a sort of cosy, jokey wonder at the sheer thoroughness with which that resource was exploited.”

  On Profanity: 4

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