Your four versions of the same narrative, perfectly consistent by and large, established your personal identities for me.
— from Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Seas: An Underwater Tour of the World by Jules Verne

It is all very well, I used to say, for young people to be engaged, if there is a certainty of their being able to marry in six months, or even in twelve; but a long engagement--" "Yes, dear ma'am," said Mrs Croft, "or an uncertain engagement, an engagement which may be long.
— from Persuasion by Jane Austen

Sign this parchment: I will bear you from hence, and you may pass your remaining years in bliss and liberty. Enjoy your existence: Indulge in every pleasure to which appetite may lead you:
— from The Monk: A Romance by M. G. (Matthew Gregory) Lewis

So shall the stream of time flow by And leave each year a richer good, And matron loveliness outvie
— from Personal Poems, Complete Volume IV of The Works of John Greenleaf Whittier by John Greenleaf Whittier

The king has been already long enough your dupe, and our duty was to enlighten him.
— from The Catholic World, Vol. 22, October, 1875, to March, 1876 A Monthly Magazine of General Literature and Science by Various

It is true, señor, that you surreptitiously handed to the Señorita Barenna a letter expressing your love?’
— from In Kedar's Tents by Henry Seton Merriman

that from a good and lovely little child he has grown better and lovelier every year, till now he is almost a man.
— from The Little Nightcap Letters by Aunt Fanny

That his lordship legally married his low-born bride at Lambeth eleven years later is beyond doubt, but that alleged first secret marriage was more than open to suspicion.
— from Love Romances of the Aristocracy by Thornton Hall

Great numbers of bitches are lost every year in the act of parturition: there seems to be a propensity in the females to associate with dogs larger than themselves, and they pay for it with their lives.
— from The Dog by William Youatt

That must be at least eight years ago, a long time in the life of a man like his brother."
— from Aliens by William McFee