Ames parentem, si equum, aliter feras; praestes parentibus pietatem, amicis dilectionem.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

The many will probably remain incredulous, for they have never seen the natural unity of ideas, but only artificial juxtapositions; not free and generous thoughts, but tricks of controversy and quips of law;—a perfect man ruling in a perfect state, even a single one they have not known.
— from The Republic by Plato

Hence is it that a pious soul, employing all its power and abilities in the pressing after such things as are farthest removed from sense, is perfectly stupid and brutish in the management of any worldly affairs; while on the other side, the vulgar are so intent upon their business and employment, that they have not time to bestow one poor thought upon a future eternity.
— from In Praise of Folly Illustrated with Many Curious Cuts by Desiderius Erasmus

The combinations most conducive to the proper movement of parts are those of two voices related within an octave 8 [ Sopr., M.-sopr., C.-alto Ten., Bar., Bass. Movement in tenths, sixths, thirds or octaves (the last very seldom) will always produce satisfactory ensemble , and if the parts progress polyphonically, it need not happen frequently that they are separated by more than a tenth, or that undesirable crossing of parts will result.
— from Principles of Orchestration, with Musical Examples Drawn from His Own Works by Nikolay Rimsky-Korsakov

For Germany, being antiently, as all other Countries, in their beginnings, divided amongst an infinite number of little Lords, or Masters of Families, that continually had wars one with another; those Masters, or Lords, principally to the end they might, when they were Covered with Arms, be known by their followers; and partly for ornament, both painted their Armor, or their Scutchion, or Coat, with the picture of some Beast, or other thing; and also put some eminent and visible mark upon the Crest of their Helmets.
— from Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes

—Should the full bliss of love, which consists in unlimited confidence, [pg 228] ever have fallen to the lot of persons other than those who are profoundly suspicious, evil, and bitter?
— from The Dawn of Day by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

And then she shewed him how, by executing various designs and paintings, she earned a pittance for her support.
— from The Last Man by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

For, perceiving no account to be made of me towards the discharge of a trust of any great concernment, and considering that through all the parts of this most noble kingdom of France, both on this and on the other side of the mountains, everyone is most diligently exercised and busied, some in the fortifying of their own native country for its defence, others in the repulsing of their enemies by an offensive war; and all this with a policy so excellent and such admirable order, so manifestly profitable for the future, whereby France shall have its frontiers most magnifically enlarged, and the French assured of a long and well-grounded peace, that very little withholds me from the opinion of good Heraclitus, which affirmeth war to be the father of all good things; and therefore do I believe that war is in Latin called bellum, not by antiphrasis, as some patchers of old rusty Latin would have us to think, because in war there is little beauty to be seen, but absolutely and simply; for that in war appeareth all that is good and graceful, and that by the wars is purged out all manner of wickedness and deformity.
— from Gargantua and Pantagruel by François Rabelais

And she shut the door behind herself and poor stumbling Ermengarde, and left Sara standing quite alone.
— from A Little Princess Being the whole story of Sara Crewe now told for the first time by Frances Hodgson Burnett

The effort for Unity could not be a partial success; even alternating Unity resolved itself into meaningless motion at last.
— from The Education of Henry Adams by Henry Adams

We, who are not accustomed to catastrophes, and who did not produce this first one, but rather suffered it, we, who easily get sea-sick after every rapid movement—think, for instance, of the former Reichstag—we shall certainly experience, as the first deep wave of the Revolution sinks into us, an aristocratic, dynastic, and plutocratic Romanticism, a yearning for the colour and glitter of the time of glory, a revolt against the spiritless, mechanical philanthrophy of unemployed orators of about fourth-form standard intellectually; against the monotonous and insincere tirades of paid agitators and their restless disciples; against laziness; ignorance, greed, and exaggeration masquerading as popular scientific economy; and against the brutal and extortionate upthrust from below.
— from The New Society by Walther Rathenau

'The old lady, now she's got some pink in her checks, and wears such a lovely sky-blue gown, is almost as nice as mother when she's going to a party,' said Ella, admiringly, 'but I am not pleased with the gentleman yet.
— from Chatterbox, 1906 by Various

Pombal instituted a police so effective, and proceeded 102 with such determined justice against all disturbers of the peace, that the roads grew suddenly safe, and the streets of Lisbon became proverbial for security, at a time when every capital of Europe was infested with robbers and assassins, and when even the state of London was so hazardous, as to be mentioned in the king's speech in 1753 as a scandal to the country.
— from Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine — Volume 56, No. 345, July, 1844 by Various

Pity that a potentate so expert at a jest could not (or would not) find one wherewith to excuse the frankness of his man-in-office!
— from The Violin Some Account of That Leading Instrument and Its Most Eminent Professors, from Its Earliest Date to the Present Time; with Hints to Amateurs, Anecdotes, etc. by George Dubourg

The place might have been desolated by a pestilence, so empty and so lifeless did it now appear.
— from The Two Destinies by Wilkie Collins