“I am sure you never could have taken it had you known what you were about.
— from A Hardy Norseman by Edna Lyall

He put his mouth to my ear and shouted, "You never could hold without it!"
— from Plain Mary Smith: A Romance of Red Saunders by Henry Wallace Phillips

I am sure you never could have done it; could you?
— from Alice Lorraine: A Tale of the South Downs by R. D. (Richard Doddridge) Blackmore

On your part, you would not have had it in your power to lend her a helping hand, nor to solace her sorrows; and so you never could have thought of her without regret and vexation.
— from Letters of John Calvin, Volume II Compiled from the Original Manuscripts and Edited with Historical Notes by Jean Calvin

That I am 'without friends' is a gross calumny, which I am sure you never could have believed, and which a thousand noble-hearted men would have good right never to forgive me for permitting to pass unnoticed and undenied.
— from International Miscellany of Literature, Art and Science, Vol. 1, No. 3, Oct. 1, 1850 by Various