I cannot but take Notice in this Place, that during this long Peace, I have not so much as heard of a Dutch Pyrate: It is not that I take them to be honester than their Neighbours; but when we account for it, it will, perhaps, be a Reproach to our selves for our want of Industry: The Reason I take to be, that after a War, when the Dutch Ships are laid up, they have a Fishery, where their Seamen find immediate Business, and as comfortable Bread as they had before.
— from A General History of the Pyrates: from their first rise and settlement in the island of Providence, to the present time by Daniel Defoe

These, it appears to me, may be all reduced to one sophism as their common genus; the mistaking the conditions of a thing for its causes and essence; and the process, by which we arrive at the knowledge of a faculty, for the faculty itself.
— from Biographia Literaria by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

Well aware of the importance of taking the foe by surprise, the Black Knight, closely followed by Cedric, threw himself upon the bridge, and reached the opposite side.
— from Ivanhoe: A Romance by Walter Scott

"It was only yesterday," (she explained,) "that he wrote his prescription; and all she has had is but one dose, and already to-day the giddiness in the head is considerably better; as regards the other symptoms they have as yet shown no marked improvement."
— from Hung Lou Meng, or, the Dream of the Red Chamber, a Chinese Novel, Book I by Xueqin Cao

If, on the other hand, we were to ask Priestley—a philosopher who had no taste for transcendental speculation, but was entirely devoted to the principles of empiricism—what his motives were for overturning those two main pillars of religion—the doctrines of the freedom of the will and the immortality of the soul (in his view the hope of a future life is but the expectation of the miracle of resurrection)—this philosopher, himself a zealous and pious teacher of religion, could give no other answer than this: I acted in the interest of reason, which always suffers, when certain objects are explained and judged by a reference to other supposed laws than those of material nature—the only laws which we know in a determinate manner.
— from The Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant

But since I have in making the Experiment concerning our Contest; chosen a Matter which penetrates the Resistance of the water; and in all figures descendes to the Bottome, the Adversaries can charge me with no defect; yea, I have propounded so much a more excellent Method than they, in as much as I have removed all other Causes, of descending or not descending to the Bottom, and retained the only sole and pure variety of Figures, demonstrating that the same Figures all descende with the only alteration of a Grain in weight: which Grain being removed, they return to float and swim; it is not true, therefore, (resuming the Example by them introduced) that I have gon{e} about to experiment the efficacy of Acuteness, in cutting with Matters unable to cut, but with Matters proportioned to our occasion, since they are subjected to no other variety, then that alone which depends on the Figure more or less acute.
— from A Discourse Presented to the Most Serene Don Cosimo II., Great Duke of Tuscany, Concerning the Natation of Bodies Vpon, and Submersion In, the Water. by Galileo Galilei

It has heretofore been a reproach to our Southern colored brother, that the attractions of a hen-roost and lusciousness of a fat turkey gobbler were too much for {31} his virtue.
— from Florida and the Game Water-Birds of the Atlantic Coast and the Lakes of the United States With a full account of the sporting along our sea-shores and inland waters, and remarks on breech-loaders and hammerless guns by Robert Barnwell Roosevelt

And to this Henry had conformed on his first visit to the city; but he had learnt that the costly and lavish feast had been of very little benefit to the really distressed, who had been thrust aside by loud-voiced miscreants and sturdy beggars, such as had no shame in driving the feeble back with blows, and receiving their own share again and again.
— from The Caged Lion by Charlotte M. (Charlotte Mary) Yonge

"Anybody'd think getting engaged was like buying a railway ticket or sending a postal order.
— from Command by William McFee

Pleasing letters from Miss Harcourt arrived by almost every post for one or other of the inmates of Oakwood, and their contents breathing her own happiness, and the warmest, most affectionate interest in the dear ones she had left, satisfied even Emmeline, from whom a fortnight's visit from the Earl and Countess of Elmore had banished all remaining trace of sadness.
— from The Mother's Recompense, Volume 1 A Sequel to Home Influence by Grace Aguilar

"I've been a readin' the other side; an' if a few more of yeh'd do the same, you'd lose some of your damn pig-headed nonsense."
— from A Spoil of Office: A Story of the Modern West by Hamlin Garland

What is wanted is a strong man who will undo things; and that will be a real test of strength.
— from What I Saw in America by G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton

It was reported that two months were required to cross their greatest breadth, and reach the other side, where they rose ten times higher, and were called large moon mountains.
— from Travels of Richard and John Lander into the interior of Africa, for the discovery of the course and termination of the Niger From unpublished documents in the possession of the late Capt. John William Barber Fullerton ... with a prefatory analysis of the previous travels of Park, Denham, Clapperton, Adams, Lyon, Ritchie, &c. into the hitherto unexplored countries of Africa by Robert Huish

He afterwards drank to a fair wind, to a continuance of the breeze, and repeated this operation so often, that what little knowledge and judgment he could boast of when he left the wharf, insensibly oozed away; and for nearly a week his mental faculties were a great deal below par.
— from Jack in the Forecastle; or, Incidents in the Early Life of Hawser Martingale by John Sherburne Sleeper