wantonness

• I have been told that they slaughtered sheep and cattle in pure wantonness, and the rats of Ehrenfels did not make a cleaner sweep of provisions. —  Campaigns of a Non-Combatant, and His Romaunt Abroad During the War
• The spirit of wantonness is, sure, scared out of him: if the devil have him not in fee-simple, with fine and recovery, he will never, I think, in the way of waste, attempt us again Mrs Ford. —  The Merry Wives of Windsor The Works of William Shakespeare [Cambridge Edition] [9 vols.]
• His theory was that the Winnebagos were not disposed to attack any party of whites in mere wantonness, the act of the Wolf being the whim of a single gnarly-brained warrior Be that as it may, our young friends were anxious to make the best progress they could, and, for fully a dozen miles, they kept up their brisk gait. —  The Hunters of the Ozark
• "Books" to him meant the doleful books that bookkeepers keep As for any further learning, he thought it a waste of time, a kind of wantonness He felt that Providence had intentionally selected a cross for him in the son who was wicked and foolish enough to want to read stories and see plays and go to school for years instead of going right into business The thought of sending his boy through a preparatory academy and college and wasting his youth on nonsense was outrageous. —  The Best Short Stories of 1920 and the Yearbook of the American Short Story
• I account these to be good arguments; nevertheless I feel also that such practices admit of easy abuse and are consequently dangerous; but then, again, I feel also this,--that if all such mistakes were to be severely visited, not many men in public life would be left with a character for honour and honesty This absolute confidence in my cause, which led me to the negligence or wantonness which I have been instancing, also laid me open, not unfairly, to the opposite charge of fierceness in certain steps which I took, or words which I published. —  Apologia Pro Vita Sua

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