primrose path

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.

1902, George Bernard Shaw, The Author's Apology, in (1902 edition of) Mrs Warren's Profession, 2006 Gutenberg eBook edition, Even if these purely official catastrophes carried any conviction, the majority of English girls remain so poor, so dependent, so well aware that the drudgeries of such honest work as is within their reach are likely enough to lead them eventually to lung disease, premature death, and domestic desertion or brutality, that they would still see reason to prefer the primrose path to the strait path of virtue, since both, vice at worst and virtue at best, lead to the same end in poverty and overwork.