primrose path

Example Sentences

• "But, good my brother, / Do not, as some ungracious pastors do, / Show me the steep and thorny way to heaven; / Whiles, like a puff'd and reckless libertine, / Himself the primrose path of dalliance treads, / And recks not his own rede."
• "Many men in his position would have preferred the primrose path of dalliance to the steep heights of duty; but Lord Arthur was too conscientious to set pleasure above principle."
• "1902, George Edward Woodberry, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Chapter 2: The Chamber under the Eaves, Cilley, his old college mate, was just elected to Congress from Maine, Pierce was just elected Senator from New Hampshire, and Longfellow had found the ways of literature as smooth as the primrose path to the everlasting bonfire."
• "1911, Frederic Taber Cooper, Preface to The Craftsmanship of Writing, The laurels of authorship are worth the winning largely because there is no primrose path leading to them."
• "The route from the desire for rationality via the desire for objectivity to descriptivism is a well trodden one; but it is nevertheless a primrose path; for, as we shall see, it leads those who follow it into one or another form of relativism, which is precisely what these thinkers are trying to avoid. They can only avoid it by retracing their steps. This primrose path starts from the assumption that the only way to achieve rationality is to secure objectivity."
• "The meanings of words are obscure enough, without adding language that results in reactions and misunderstandings. By using jargon, clichés, exaggeration, and unnecessary words, we will be led down the primrose path of misdirection."