Citations:rather
English citations of rather
1536
Mine own John Poynz, since ye delight to know
The cause why that homeward I me draw,
And flee the press of courts, whereso they go,
Rather than to live thrall under the awe
Of lordly looks, wrappèd within my cloak,
To will and lust learning to set a law:
— Thomas Wyatt
1590
Well hoped I, and faire beginnings had,
That he my captiue langour should redeeme,
Till all vnweeting, an Enchaunter bad
His sence abusd, and made him to misdeeme
My loyalty, not such as it did seeme;
That rather death desire, then such despight.
— Edmund Spenser, The Faerie Queen, Book I, Canto VII
Late 1500's
I rather would have lost my life betimes
Than bring a burthen of dishonour home
By staying there so long till all were lost.
— William Shakespeare, Henry VI, Part ii, Act III, Scene I
1674
Eve loath to be thought not circumspect or firm enough, urges her going apart, the rather desirous to make tryal of her strength:
— John Milton, Paradise Lost, Book IX
1791
"I would rather (said he) have the rod to be the general terrour to all, to make them learn, than tell a child, if you do thus, or thus, you will be more esteemed than your brothers or sisters.
— James Boswell, Life of Johnson (Anno 1709-27)
1851
True, they rather order me about some, and make me jump from spar to spar, like a grasshopper in a May meadow. — Herman Melville, Moby Dick, Chapter 1
1875
With an anvil-ding
And with fire in him forge thy will
Or rather, rather then, stealing as Spring
Through him, melt him but master him still:
— Gerald Manley Hopkins, The Wreck of the Deutschland
- 1922, H. G. Wells, A Short History of the World, London: Watts & Co., published 1946, page 7:
- Very early appear certain creatures rather like plant-lice, crawling creatures which could roll themselves up into balls as plant-lice do, the trilobites.
Middle English citations of rather
Late 1300's
But rather wolde he yeven, out of doute,
Unto his povre parisshens aboute
— Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales, General Prologue