Whether Chichikov’s words now voiced sufficiently the note of persuasion, or whether Tientietnikov happened, at the moment, to be unusually disposed to frankness, at all events the young landowner sighed, and then responded as he expelled a puff of tobacco smoke: “To attain anything, Paul Ivanovitch, one needs to have been born under a lucky star.”
— from Dead Souls by Nikolai Vasilevich Gogol

All his emotions and passions wish to assert their rights, and how remote a passion is From that cautious utility which consists in personal profit!
— from The Will to Power: An Attempted Transvaluation of All Values. Book III and IV by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

"I don't want to see him down in our shabby, untidy little drawing-room, to hear mamma talk about her expenses and papa's difficulties—to see all that tribe of children in their old frocks—to see the muddle in which we live!
— from A True Friend: A Novel by Adeline Sergeant

There are dances of the Bacchic sort, both those in which, as they say, they imitate drunken men, and which are named after the Nymphs, and Pan, and Silenuses, and Satyrs; and also those in which purifications are made or mysteries celebrated—all this sort of dancing cannot be rightly defined as having either a peaceful or a warlike character, or indeed as having any meaning whatever, and may, I think, be most truly described as distinct from the warlike dance, and distinct from the peaceful, and not suited for a city at all.
— from Laws by Plato

Weathers made them all have just one little tincture at his expense and promised to meet them later on at Mulligan’s in Poolbeg Street.
— from Dubliners by James Joyce

Mr. Fairlie arched his eyebrows and pursed up his lips in sarcastic surprise.
— from The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins

Two Seidlitz powders, one in blue And one in white, together drew And having each a pleasant sense Of t'other powder's excellence, Forsook their jackets for the snug Enjoyment of a common mug.
— from The Devil's Dictionary by Ambrose Bierce

The Bishop had just bent down, and was sighing as he examined a plant of cochlearia des Guillons, which the basket had broken as it fell across the bed.
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

“Every day we kill a turkey and pigeons on purpose for him, I make a compote with my own hands, and he eats a plateful of broth and a bit of meat the size of a finger and gets up from the table.
— from Project Gutenberg Compilation of 233 Short Stories of Chekhov by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

Love had doubled all her excellencies, and placed a diadem on her genius.
— from The Last Man by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

All the earth below her Answers to her gaze, And her eyes are pensive With remembered days.
— from Later Poems by Bliss Carman

With this counsel in mind the girl struggled bravely against her emotion, and presently, wiping her eyes, turned toward the nurse.
— from Peggy Owen at Yorktown by Lucy Foster Madison

But at times there came over him a deep and keen sentiment of remorse; and even, as his experienced and practised eye saw the moment of his triumph approach, he felt that the success he was hazarding his own soul and hers to obtain, might bring him a momentary transport, but not a permanent happiness.
— from Falkland, Book 3. by Lytton, Edward Bulwer Lytton, Baron

dixo de las riqueças de oro y plata que auia en su tierra que no curaron de buscar las uacas mas de quanto bieron algunas pocas luego bolbieron por dar a el general la rica notiçia a el indio llamaron turco porque lo pareçia en el aspecto y a esta sacon el general auia embiado a don garcia lopes de lopes de cardenas a tiguex con gente a haçer el aposẽto para lleuar alli a inbernar el campo que a la sason auia llegado de señora y quando hernando de albarado llego a tiguex de buelta de cicuye hallo a don garcia lopes de cardenas y fue neçesario que no pasase adelante y como los naturales les inportase que biesen digo diesen
— from The Coronado Expedition, 1540-1542. Excerpted from the Fourteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1892-1893, Part 1. by George Parker Winship

This great and good man both saw and lamented the corrupt state of the church to which he belonged, and turned all his episcopal and personal influence to purify it from these flagrant corruptions.
— from The Picture Gallery Explored Or, an account of various ancient customs and manners: interspersed with anecdotes and biographical sketches of eminent persons by Unknown

Now I saw clearly how difficult it was to turn night into day, for I found myself condemned either to waste many hours that ought to be consumed on my pilgrimage, or else to march on under the extreme heat; and when I had drunk what was left of my Brule wine (which then seemed delicious), and had eaten a piece of bread, I stiffly jolted down the bank and regained the highway.
— from The Path to Rome by Hilaire Belloc

Madame de Livonne, although for herself she would have preferred her independence, nevertheless accepted a proposition, which insured to Euphemia a happier existence, and probably, also, a valuable protection.
— from Moral Tales by Madame (Elisabeth Charlotte Pauline) Guizot

Thus he fills a middle place between the men who made an honest effort at painting nature as they saw and felt it, but could not altogether rid themselves of their early education, and the lawless band who, with the purple banner of impressionism, now riot joyously in the fields, with brave show of gleaming color, and fearless attempt to enlist science in their ranks.
— from McClure's Magazine, Vol. 6, No. 5, April, 1896 by Various

A peep into Mrs. Cooper's room revealed something that says much for the continued determination of purpose which has always characterized the great painter's life, and his extraordinary and persistent powers of endurance under great suffering.
— from The Strand Magazine, Vol. 07, Issue 39, March 1894 An Illustrated Monthly by Various