These too, like most of the other affections, appear to be caused by certain contractions and dilations, but they have besides more of roughness and smoothness than is found in other affections; for whenever earthy particles enter into the small veins which are the testing instruments of the tongue, reaching to the heart, and fall upon the moist, delicate portions of flesh—when, as they are dissolved, they contract and dry up the little veins, they are astringent if they are rougher, but if not so rough, then only harsh.
— from Timaeus by Plato

Forgive my vanity as a relation, but I never doubted it.
— from War and Peace by Tolstoy, Leo, graf

I do not know the young man; he is said to be of good family and rich, but I never trust to vague assertions.
— from The Count of Monte Cristo, Illustrated by Alexandre Dumas

But I think no one has as yet discovered, or at any rate brought into notice, the true facts of the case, or the real position of the matter, and I think I am the first to put into print what actually were the rules which governed the matter.
— from A Complete Guide to Heraldry by Arthur Charles Fox-Davies

Not a word has he said, then, of that which could give them happiness; but proof of their misery he has given, acknowledging that their mind, by which they rank as reasonable beings, is not only not imbued and fortified with virtue so as to resist all unreasonable passions, but that it is somehow agitated with tempestuous emotions, and is thus on a level with the mind of foolish men.
— from The City of God, Volume I by Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Hippo

We spent part of an afternoon and a night at sea, and reached Bluff, in New Zealand, early in the morning.
— from Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World by Mark Twain

Next you must consider what the nature of a living being demands, and allow yourself everything of this kind by which your nature as a rational being is not made worse.
— from The Meditations of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius Antoninus A new rendering based on the Foulis translation of 1742 by Emperor of Rome Marcus Aurelius

I call it a revolution because I now see how, with the word he spoke, the curtain rose on the last act of my dreadful drama, and the catastrophe was precipitated.
— from The Turn of the Screw by Henry James

The belief in the Tylwyth Teg was quite general fifty or sixty years ago, and as sincere as any religious belief is now.’
— from The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries by W. Y. (Walter Yeeling) Evans-Wentz

Late in 1313 (October or November) we have a Petition to the King (of England) from the People of Scotland, by their envoys, Sir Patrick de Dunbar, Earl of March, and Sir Adam de Gordon , complaining of the great losses they have suffered “by their enemies”— i.e. , the Bruce party—also of the brigandage of the English garrison in Berwick and Roxburgh ( Bain , iii., No. 337).
— from The Bruce by John Barbour

If the first root corresponded to their average, it might be considered as reliable, but if not anyone will grant that an average is more reliable than a single determination.
— from Species and Varieties, Their Origin by Mutation by Hugo de Vries

The systematic and rigorous Boycott is now at an end, but the spirit it created in the people still persists….
— from Turkey: a Past and a Future by Arnold Toynbee

I suppose," he continued in his driest tones, "you won't want to bring in another Reform Bill immediately?" "No, sir," Vaughan answered gratefully.
— from Chippinge Borough by Stanley John Weyman

His lordship, to be sure, could not be expected to know that recent events had utterly depreciated the selling value of Minden Cottage over the whole of the south and east of Cornwall; that the homeward-trudging labourer would breathe a prayer as he neared it along the high-road in the dark, and would shut his eyes and run by it, nor draw breath until he reached the lodge, down the road; that quite a number of Christian folk who had been used to envy my father the snuggest little retreat within twenty miles would now have refused a hundred pounds to spend one night in it.
— from Poison Island by Arthur Quiller-Couch

The two chief lines of thought traceable throughout the Dialectic are represented by its negative and by its positive tendencies respectively.
— from A Commentary to Kant's 'Critique of Pure Reason' by Norman Kemp Smith

The tree is not found in all regions between its northern and southern limits.
— from American Forest Trees by Henry H. Gibson

Women play much better now, as a rule, but I never hear one who is an amateur play as she did.
— from The Three Miss Kings: An Australian Story by Ada Cambridge

It may be headed up simply with the hammer, or with a rivet header, M. When necessary, the process may be reversed and the head made first; but when made in this way, a rivet block is needed to rest the head in while making the burr.
— from Copper Work: A Text Book for Teachers and Students in the Manual Arts by Augustus F. (Augustus Foster) Rose

1815, and up to the year 1833 lived the ordinary life of a peasant, blameless and religious, but in no respect otherwise remarkable.
— from Journal in France in 1845 and 1848 with Letters from Italy in 1847 Of Things and Persons Concerning the Church and Education by T. W. (Thomas William) Allies