So the questions you have to put to yourselves are these—"Have we read the world wrong, and based our relation to it upon an ignorance of human nature?
— from Nationalism by Rabindranath Tagore

“Stay,” said Monte Cristo, “here, in this very spot” (and he stamped upon the ground), “I had the earth dug up and fresh mould put in, to refresh these old trees; well, my man, digging, found a box, or rather, the iron-work of a box, in the midst of which was the skeleton of a newly born infant.”
— from The Count of Monte Cristo, Illustrated by Alexandre Dumas

XL A Book of Revelation The Irvings came back to Echo Lodge for the summer, and Anne spent a happy three weeks there in July.
— from Anne of the Island by L. M. (Lucy Maud) Montgomery

Bloom there for a languor he had but was now better, he having dreamed tonight a strange fancy of his dame Mrs Moll with red slippers on in a pair of Turkey trunks which is thought by those in ken to be for a change and Mistress Purefoy there, that got in through pleading her belly, and now on the stools, poor body, two days past her term, the midwives sore put to it and can’t deliver, she queasy for a bowl of riceslop that is a shrewd drier up of the insides and her breath very heavy more than good and should be a bullyboy from the knocks, they say, but God give her soon issue. ’
— from Ulysses by James Joyce

He gave it me for a bunch of roses that I gave him for his sweetheart.
— from The Railway Children by E. (Edith) Nesbit

"While the stripes were succeeding each other, and poor Peel writhing under them, Byron saw and felt for the misery of his friend; and although he knew that he was not strong enough to fight ****** with any hope of success, and that it was dangerous even to approach him, he advanced to the scene of action, and with a blush of rage, tears in his eyes, and a voice trembling between terror and indignation, asked very humbly if ****** would be pleased to tell him 'how many stripes he meant to inflict.'
— from Homes and Haunts of the Most Eminent British Poets, Vol. 1 (of 2) by William Howitt

Altogether, and because of rather than in spite of his weakness, Dick is a captivating person.
— from The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete by John Forster

I abhor books of religion, though I reverence and love my God, without the blasphemous notions of sectaries, or belief in their absurd and damnable heresies, mysteries, and Thirty-nine Articles.
— from Life of Lord Byron, Vol. 1 With His Letters and Journals by Thomas Moore

'Then we shall both have the consolation, my lord,' Curran retorted, with a bow, 'of reflecting that I'm not the worst thing you have committed.'
— from My Lords of Strogue, Vol. 3 (of 3) A Chronicle of Ireland, from the Convention to the Union by Lewis Wingfield

In man, goodness is the path toward higher development, and a radiant beauty is the crown and perfection of life; so the trinity of Truth, Goodness, and Beauty, often referred to in literature, may, without undue stretching, be considered as also equivalent to what is represented by the words, the Way, the Truth, and the Life; they are three aspects of what after all is one essential unity.
— from The Substance of Faith Allied with Science (6th Ed.) A Catechism for Parents and Teachers by Lodge, Oliver, Sir

I have already mentioned my reason for making New Holland so far to the southward: for I never doubted of numerous openings in the reef through which I could have access to the shore and, knowing the inclination of the coast to be to the north-west and the wind mostly to the southward of east, I could with ease range such a barrier of reefs till I should find a passage, which now became absolutely necessary, without a moment's loss of time.
— from A Voyage to the South Sea Undertaken by command of His Majesty for the purpose of conveying the bread-fruit tree to the West Indies in His Majesty's ship the Bounty commanded by Lieutenant William Bligh; including an account of the mutiny on board the said ship and the subsequent voyage of part of the crew in the ship's boat from Tofoa, one of the Friendly Islands, to Timor, a Dutch settlement in the East Indies by William Bligh

We believe, that had the confidently anticipated deluge of blood followed the abolition of slavery in the British West Indies, the calamity would have been the consequence, not of abolition, but of resistance to it.
— from The Anti-Slavery Examiner, Part 2 of 4 by American Anti-Slavery Society

“How glow pigtail one day?” cried Ching scornfully; and pulling round his own, he held it out, fully four feet in length—a long black plait, with a bit of ribbon tying it at the end.
— from Blue Jackets: The Log of the Teaser by George Manville Fenn