For if he had dealt with them with competent knowledge, as the case really is, so he would have considered that the good and the bad are each very few in number, and that those between both are most numerous."
— from Apology, Crito, and Phaedo of Socrates by Plato

Nevertheless Porphyry, as I have said, did considerably improve upon this opinion, in so far, at least, as he maintained that human souls could transmigrate only into human bodies, and made no scruple about demolishing the bestial prisons into which Plato had wished to cast them.
— from The City of God, Volume I by Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Hippo

We lay a cat on a soft bolster—she stretches herself, spreads and thins herself out, in order to bring as many nerve termini as possible into contact with the pleasant stimuli of the bolster.
— from Criminal Psychology: A Manual for Judges, Practitioners, and Students by Hans Gross

To him Davout was not merely a French general, but a man notorious for his cruelty.
— from War and Peace by Tolstoy, Leo, graf

It is not by any means necessary, and it is not, humanly speaking, possible, that the final scheme should be the work of one mind.
— from Garden Cities of To-Morrow Being the Second Edition of "To-Morrow: a Peaceful Path to Real Reform" by Howard, Ebenezer, Sir

And Hetty's foolish joys and hopes, which had flown away for a little space, scared by a mere nothing, now all came fluttering back, unconscious of the real peril.
— from Adam Bede by George Eliot

Of his personal courage I had the opportunity afterwards of witnessing one striking example, and brilliant as have been the achievements of many of our Indian civilians, I do not think that his coolness and fortitude in the moment of peril have ever been surpassed by any man not bred to war.
— from A Diplomat in Japan The inner history of the critical years in the evolution of Japan when the ports were opened and the monarchy restored, recorded by a diplomatist who took an active part in the events of the time, with an account of his personal experiences during that period by Ernest Mason Satow

For the point is this: that the umbrella is a shield against an enemy so actual as to be a mere nuisance; whereas the stick is a sword against enemies so entirely imaginary as to be a pure pleasure.
— from What's Wrong with the World by G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton

In the meantime,” continued she, “I must inform you of the character I bear among my neighbours.
— from The Adventures of Roderick Random by T. (Tobias) Smollett

Before all masters, necessity is the one most listened to, and who teaches the best.
— from The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne

It was probably some stupid business about "money not being paid into the Court," which had been left over from cases tried and lost; and he had had a number of cases that summer.
— from The Money Master, Volume 2. by Gilbert Parker

He said he would take me to several waters between here and Youldeh, by a more northerly route than he had previously shown; he said that water existed at several places which he enumerated on his fingers; their names were Taloreh, Edoldeh, Cudyeh, Yanderby, Mobing, Bring, Poothraba, Pondoothy, and Youldeh.
— from Australia Twice Traversed The Romance of Exploration, Being a Narrative Compiled from the Journals of Five Exploring Expeditions into and Through Central South Australia and Western Australia, from 1872 to 1876 by Ernest Giles

"Indeed, indeed this must be a Midsummer Night's Dream!"
— from The Zankiwank and The Bletherwitch: An Original Fantastic Fairy Extravaganza by S. J. Adair (Shafto Justin Adair) Fitz-Gerald

This object may likewise be the mere destruction of the enemy's armed force; but that is not by any means necessary, and it may be something quite different.
— from On War — Volume 1 by Carl von Clausewitz

He reached him while he was still struggling under the water: he plunged; but by a movement natural to those who are drowning, even when they drown themselves intentionally, the young man seized hold of him, grasping his legs so tightly, that he prevented his swimming.
— from Popular Tales by Madame (Elisabeth Charlotte Pauline) Guizot

'Look to thy own business and meddle not with mine.
— from The Brothers-In-Law: A Tale Of The Equatorial Islands; and The Brass Gun Of The Buccaneers 1901 by Louis Becke

Pretty Vanna, mother as she had been to her brothers and sisters, was to be a mother no more.
— from Little Novels of Italy by Maurice Hewlett

[251] The only information I have on the Paniquita dialect is that given in the Revue de Linguistique , July, 1879, by a missionary (name not furnished).
— from The American Race A Linguistic Classification and Ethnographic Description of the Native Tribes of North and South America by Daniel G. (Daniel Garrison) Brinton

I am where I would wish to be, While the rain above and the mud below Affects me not where’er I go—— Though the sleet and the slush be ankle deep, What matters?
— from The True History of Tom & Jerry or, The Day and Night Scenes, of Life in London from the Start to the Finish! by W. T. (William Thomas) Moncrieff