The raising of ghosts or devils was a promise liberally accorded by my favourite authors, the fulfilment of which I most eagerly sought; and if my incantations were always unsuccessful, I attributed the failure rather to my own inexperience and mistake, than to a want of skill or fidelity in my instructors.
— from Frankenstein; Or, The Modern Prometheus by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

Every gondola that swam by us, with its crescents and pyramids and circles of colored lamps hung aloft, and lighting up the faces of the young and the sweet-scented and lovely below, was a picture; and the reflections of those lights, so long, so slender, so numberless, so many-colored and so distorted and wrinkled by the waves, was a picture likewise, and one that was enchantingly beautiful.
— from The Innocents Abroad by Mark Twain

Pinocchio runs the danger of being fried in a pan like a fish During that wild chase, Pinocchio lived through a terrible moment when he almost gave himself up as lost.
— from The Adventures of Pinocchio by Carlo Collodi

A person leaving any liquor in his glass, is frequently called upon by the toast-master to take off his heel-tap.
— from 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue by Francis Grose

After denouncing the iniquities of both the Catholic and Protestant faiths, Lambert demonstrates "the absurdities of the Jewish religion, of this domineering religion"; he thunders against Moses "governing a simple and agrarian people like all clever impostors," against "the servile respect of the Jews for their kings ...
— from Secret Societies And Subversive Movements by Nesta Helen Webster

It is quite true that the average man is a potential landlord, and as ready to appropriate the unearned increment as to cry out against its appropriation.
— from Garden Cities of To-Morrow Being the Second Edition of "To-Morrow: a Peaceful Path to Real Reform" by Howard, Ebenezer, Sir

Consequently he presently became a political leader, and was elected to a petty office under the city government.
— from The Gilded Age: A Tale of Today by Charles Dudley Warner

Then, to save the object Sought at such a price, Like a deer in semblance Sped the sacrifice.
— from The Rámáyan of Válmíki, translated into English verse by Valmiki

In spite of all this, the teamster having it in charge assured Binney that it was a perfect lamb, and the rodman, anxious to prove his ability to ride a mule, which some of the boys had doubted, ordered the animal to be saddled.
— from Campmates: A Story of the Plains by Kirk Munroe

Females, children, and persons leading a sedentary life, should confine themselves to a sufficient quantity of good meal-bread with only a moderate quantity of butter, to which an egg, or a small rasher of mild bacon, may be advantageously added.
— from Cooley's Cyclopædia of Practical Receipts and Collateral Information in the Arts, Manufactures, Professions, and Trades..., Sixth Edition, Volume I by Richard Vine Tuson

Calls have come to him to develop new church work simply because the poor people of other churches have seen and felt the higher standards of piety and purer lives among many in the Congregational churches and have desired that they too might have the advantage of such ministers.
— from The American Missionary — Volume 49, No. 05, May, 1895 by Various

This, sir, is my plan: I have done my part of it; Nature has done hers: you are popular, you are eloquent; aw parties like and respect you; and now, sir, it only remains for you to be directed—completion follows.
— from The Man of the World (1792) by Charles Macklin

If the present Government, instead of making promotions at the bidding of parliamentary interest, would appoint a proved leader as Commander-in-Chief, Hindostan might be tranquil once more and Russia overawed.’
— from Babes in the Bush by Rolf Boldrewood

But already Marya had engaged him in half smiling, low-voiced conversation; and Palla looked at her golden-green eyes and warm, rich colouring, cooled by a skin 111 of snow.
— from The Crimson Tide: A Novel by Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers

My dear household, cease singing and psalmodying; lay aside your fiddles, take out your work-implements, if you have any; for I can say with confidence the laws of gravitation are still active, and rusty nails, worm-eaten dovetailings, and secret coherency of old carpentry, are not the best basis for a household!—In the lanes of Irish cities, I have heard say, the wretched people are sometimes found living, and perilously boiling their potatoes, on such swing-floors and inclined planes hanging on by the joist-ends; but I did not hear that they sang very much in celebration of such lodging.
— from Latter-Day Pamphlets by Thomas Carlyle