It is occupied chiefly with elementary passions and emotions,--love and hate, joy and sorrow, fear and faith,--which are an essential part of our human nature; and the more it reflects these emotions the more surely does it awaken a response in men of every race.
— from English Literature Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English-Speaking World by William J. (William Joseph) Long

She took his hand and led him into a room carpeted and furnished like her own; indeed, down to the smallest details, it was a reproduction in miniature of Delphine’s apartment.
— from Father Goriot by Honoré de Balzac

Yes, they are royal men; but their art is not the same with the art of those whom you call, and rightly, in my opinion, dialecticians:—Still we are in the dark about rhetoric.
— from Phaedrus by Plato

In all ages, there have been such, that either deny God in all, or in part; some deride him, they could have made a better world, and ruled it more orderly themselves, blaspheme him, derogate at their pleasure from him.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

He opened the letter she had brought, and read: "I make only one condition—that you are tender and kind to her.
— from Jude the Obscure by Thomas Hardy

At the end of that time the child has, in all probability, added one more to the tombstones that crowd the Neo-Therapeutic Cemetery; but on rare occasions a glad procession bears back the little one to his exultant parents, no longer a Polygon, but a Circle, at least by courtesy: and a single instance of so blessed a result induces multitudes of Polygonal parents to submit to similar domestic sacrifices, which have a dissimilar issue.
— from Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions (Illustrated) by Edwin Abbott Abbott

"They are right," Ivan Matveitch observed tranquilly; "the principles of economics before everything."
— from Short Stories by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Every vital activity of any depth and range inevitably meets obstacles in the course of its effort to realize itself—a fact that renders the search for artificial or external problems quite superfluous.
— from How We Think by John Dewey

I took his hand within my own, as I said: "Any resentment I may once have cherished toward you, Mr. Judson, has long since passed away.
— from Walter Harland Or, Memories of the Past by Harriet S. Caswell

Elephants are bred over all those Provinces, and of wonderful greatness; though some report, they cannot kneel, nor lie down, they can do both, and have their Joynts as other Creatures for use: With their Fore-feet they will leap upon Trees to pull down the Boughs, and are of that strength, they will shake a great Cocao Tree for the Nuts, and pull down a good Tree with their Tusks, to get the Leaves to eat, as well as Sedge and long Grass, Cocao Nuts and Berries, &c. which with their Trunk they put in their Mouth, and chew it with their smaller Teeth; in most of those Provinces, are many rich Mines, but the Negroes opposed the Portugueses for working in them. {MN} Wild Elephants. {MN} The Kingdom of Angola is wonderful populous, and rich in Mines of Silver, Copper, and most other Metals; fruitfull in all manner of Food, and sundry sorts of Cattel, but Dogs Flesh they love better than any other Meat; they use few Clothes, and no Armour; Bows, Arrows, and Clubs are their Weapons.
— from The True Travels, Adventures, and Observations of Captain John Smith into Europe, Asia, Africa, and America From Ann. Dom. 1593 to 1629 by John Smith

And Richard thinks so, too, for he said so to me; and Richard is my oracle, Alizon."
— from The Lancashire Witches: A Romance of Pendle Forest by William Harrison Ainsworth

In the first place, then, when I talk of "a reason," I mean only a good reason and not a bad one.
— from Philosophical Studies by G. E. (George Edward) Moore

Though no one thinks more highly of these qualities in the Americans, considered in connexion with practical things, than myself, no one probably gives them less credit for their ability to distinguish between appearances and reality, in matters of principle."
— from Home as Found Sequel to "Homeward Bound" by James Fenimore Cooper

At their commencement trade was free in all, and religion in most of the new colonies; and it was only by slow degrees that their fiscal regulations were brought under the subordination of the mother country.
— from The Conquest of Canada, Vol. 1 by George Warburton

And to this they add, that it is particularly strange and amazing that John, who was present at the crucifixion,* should not only forbear to mention any one of the terrible appearances recorded in Matthew on that occasion, but that even the darkness of three hours' duration, which must have made the most lasting impression on every individual in Judea, should also be by him totally unnoticed. *
— from The Doubts of Infidels Or, Queries Relative to Scriptural Inconsistencies & Contradictions by William Nicholson