This sight filled Nastagio's mind at once with terror and amazement and after stirred him to compassion of the ill-fortuned lady, wherefrom arose a desire to deliver her, an but he might, from such anguish and death.
— from The Decameron of Giovanni Boccaccio by Giovanni Boccaccio

Princes and lords may flourish or may fade; / A breath can make them, as a breath has made.
— from Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern, English and Foreign Sources Including Phrases, Mottoes, Maxims, Proverbs, Definitions, Aphorisms, and Sayings of Wise Men, in Their Bearing on Life, Literature, Speculation, Science, Art, Religion, and Morals, Especially in the Modern Aspects of Them by Wood, James, Rev.

He always brought his mother to church, and was the pride of all the matrons.
— from The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain

After breakfast he meditated for a quarter of an hour; then two generals seated themselves on the truss of straw, pen in hand and their paper on their knees, and the Emperor dictated to them the order of battle.
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

But what made him still more fortunate, as he said himself, was having a daughter of such exceeding beauty, rare intelligence, gracefulness, and virtue, that everyone who knew her and beheld her marvelled at the extraordinary gifts with which heaven and nature had endowed her.
— from Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

and left me hope That in mine own heart I can live down sin And be his mate hereafter in the heavens Before high God.
— from Idylls of the King by Tennyson, Alfred Tennyson, Baron

The instrument was unlocked, every body prepared to be charmed, and Marianne, who sang very well, at their request went through the chief of the songs which Lady Middleton had brought into the family on her marriage, and which perhaps had lain ever since in the same position on the pianoforte, for her ladyship had celebrated that event by giving up music, although by her mother's account, she had played extremely well, and by her own was very fond of it.
— from Sense and Sensibility by Jane Austen

For if the fleet had left Samos, the enemy could without a battle have made themselves masters of the whole of Ionia, the Hellespont, and the islands in the Aegean while Athenians would have fought with Athenians in their own city.
— from Plutarch's Lives, Volume 1 (of 4) by Plutarch

In conclusion, he always does as much good by his personal efforts as by his money.
— from Emile by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

A diplomat must possess it; the best diplomats develop it, just as a great musician of rich natural talent must develop this by years of arduous practice; perhaps an explorer or collector like myself may possess it even most of all, because he must be a trained observer, which enables him to buttress the psychic and the mental with a precise faculty for grasping subtle physical signs.
— from The Mountain of Fears by Henry C. (Henry Cottrell) Rowland

"It is the soul-struggle we are analyzing——" "But he must have come to some conclusion?"
— from On the Lightship by Herman Knickerbocker Vielé

The little girl, Marion, being left alone by her mother, was secretly visited by the father, who seems to have made sure of the time when the child was to be found alone.
— from Plays by August Strindberg, Second series by August Strindberg

The States' ambassador begged his masters to reflect whether this "puissant and experienced corsair" should be permitted to serve Spaniard or Frenchman, and whether they could devise no expedient for turning him into another track.
— from PG Edition of Netherlands series — Complete by John Lothrop Motley

He carried the flowers she had finished, on his way to the bureau, and bought her materials on his way back; then, while waiting for dinner, he stamped out her leaves, trimmed the twigs, or rubbed her colors.
— from The Works of Balzac: A linked index to all Project Gutenberg editions by Honoré de Balzac

And besides, he might just as well sleep in his cellars as in his carriage, for he never rode a horse if he could get out of doing so.
— from The Princess Elopes by Harold MacGrath

Great shearers they were, too, for the mountain air bred hardy men, and while they were at it they worked feverishly, bending themselves nearly double over the sheep, and making the shears fly till the sweat ran down their foreheads and dripped on the ground; and they peeled the yellow wool off sheep after sheep as an expert cook peels an apple.
— from An Outback Marriage: A Story of Australian Life by A. B. (Andrew Barton) Paterson

One day at grey dawn he was tagging along behind his mother as she prowled in the rear of the Hotel.
— from Johnny Bear, and Other Stories from Lives of the Hunted by Ernest Thompson Seton

Get her coat, Eddie, and bring her my sweater to wear underneath.
— from Just Around the Corner: Romance en casserole by Fannie Hurst