selfish

A more selfish man than I am might hold you to that engagement; a less considerate man than I am might keep you waiting for years -- and to no purpose after all.

Selfish, indeed, were he who would envy you one petal of that wonderful rose--Rosa Mundi--God has given you to gather.

"You are a selfish brute, and you do just as you like without considering anyone else.

But when an unkind word is on your lips, when a selfish, angry feeling rises in your heart, or an unkind, cruel deed is to be done, then will you hear the soft, low chime of the flower-bell; listen to its warning, let the word remain unspoken, the deed undone, and in the quiet joy of your own heart, and the magic perfume of your bosom flower, you will find a sweet reward."

"Well, now, there's Mammy," said Marie, "I think it's selfish of her to sleep so sound nights; she knows I need little attentions almost every hour, when my worst turns are on, and yet she's so hard to wake.

It is hard that my little darling should love him more than me; and that, when the well-being and culture of my son is all I have to live for, I should see my influence destroyed by one whose selfish affection is more injurious than the coldest indifference or the harshest tyranny could be.

"I'm not selfish." Brissenden grinned soberly in the way he had when pleased by the thing his thin lips were about to shape.

It was incomprehensible that she should care so much for a man who was so indifferent, so selfish, so grossly self-indulgent; and he divined dimly that in her heart she knew his indifference and his selfishness, knew them and loved him humbly all the same.

"I'm not as selfish as you, because I'm always ill, and I'm sure there is a lump coming on my back," he said.

Only in the garden of the Selfish Giant it was still winter.

"The average man IS selfish," the Bishop affirmed valiantly.

But I have no sympathy with the purely selfish pleasure which some men appear to derive from dwelling on the minute anatomy of their own feelings, under the pr essure of adverse fortune.