Ambition \Am*bi"tion\, n. [F. ambition, L. ambitio a going around, especially of candidates for office is Rome, to solicit votes (hence, desire for office or honor? fr. ambire to go around. See Ambient, Issue.]

1. The act of going about to solicit or obtain an office, or any other object of desire; canvassing. [Obs.]

[I] used no ambition to commend my deeds. --Milton.

2. An eager, and sometimes an inordinate, desire for preferment, honor, superiority, power, or the attainment of something.

Cromwell, I charge thee, fling a way ambition: By that sin fell the angels. --Shak.

The pitiful ambition of possessing five or six thousand more acres. --Burke.

Source: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)
 

Ambition \Am*bi"tion\, v. t. [Cf. F. ambitionner.]

To seek after ambitiously or eagerly; to covet. [R.]

Pausanias, ambitioning the sovereignty of Greece, bargains with Xerxes for his daughter in marriage. --Trumbull.

Source: Webster's Revised Unabridged Dictionary (1913)