They who in my time have attempted to correct the manners of the world by new opinions, reform seeming vices; but the essential vices they leave as they were, if indeed they do not augment them, and augmentation is therein to be feared; we defer all other well doing upon the account of these external reformations, of less cost and greater show, and thereby expiate good cheap, for the other natural, consubstantial, and intestine vices.
— from Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Complete by Michel de Montaigne

[732] As to what they say about nothing being able to rise again but what falls, whence they conclude that resurrection pertains to bodies only, and not to souls, because bodies fall, why do they make nothing of the words, "Ye that fear the Lord, wait for His mercy; and go not aside lest ye fall;"
— from The City of God, Volume II by Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Hippo

More than fifty texts have been found which declare, either explicitly or by implication, that God the Father has no equal, which effectually denies or shuts out the divine equality of the Son.
— from The World's Sixteen Crucified Saviors; Or, Christianity Before Christ by Kersey Graves

Now, therefore, I say battle with your pride and beat it; cherish not your anger for ever; the might and majesty of heaven are more than ours, but even heaven may be appeased; and if a man has sinned he prays the gods, and reconciles them to himself by his piteous cries and by frankincense, with drink-offerings and the savour of burnt sacrifice.
— from The Iliad by Homer

When they viewed with complacency the extent of their own mental powers, when they exercised the various faculties of memory, of fancy, and of judgment, in the most profound speculations, or the most important labors, and when they reflected on the desire of fame, which transported them into future ages, far beyond the bounds of death and of the grave, they were unwilling to confound themselves with the beasts of the field, or to suppose that a being, for whose dignity they entertained the most sincere admiration, could be limited to a spot of earth, and to a few years of duration.
— from The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Table of Contents with links in the HTML file to the two Project Gutenberg editions (12 volumes) by Edward Gibbon

One sergeant cried for mercy; he had nine wounds, and was a brave fellow who did not deserve ill treatment.
— from Household Tales by Brothers Grimm by Wilhelm Grimm

And Ráma to his brother cried, Whose cheek by blanching fear was dried: “Alas, we fall, O valiant chief, From sorrow into direr grief, Still mourning her I hold so dear
— from The Rámáyan of Válmíki, translated into English verse by Valmiki

In plenteous streams the candles' tears do drop, but for whom do they weep?
— from Hung Lou Meng, or, the Dream of the Red Chamber, a Chinese Novel, Book I by Xueqin Cao

But, although so cunningly contrived, this plan was frustrated by Frigga, who, divining his purpose, waited until he was sound asleep, and then noiselessly turned his couch so that he should face her favourites.
— from Myths of the Norsemen: From the Eddas and Sagas by H. A. (Hélène Adeline) Guerber

For the first time the clean blue sky became a sinister blanket from which dropped destruction.
— from The Forest of Swords: A Story of Paris and the Marne by Joseph A. (Joseph Alexander) Altsheler

He was a splendid looking fellow, resplendent in the gorgeous trappings of an Odwar, the five brilliant feathers which denoted his position rising defiantly erect from his thick, black hair.
— from The Chessmen of Mars by Edgar Rice Burroughs

It is a bill for work done:— s. d.
— from The Queer, the Quaint and the Quizzical: A Cabinet for the Curious by Frank H. Stauffer

[Pg 131] We did stop briefly at the Pnyx hill—the gathering-place of the Athenians—and stood on the rostrum cut from the living rock—the "Bema" from which Demosthenes harangued the populace.
— from The Ship-Dwellers: A Story of a Happy Cruise by Albert Bigelow Paine

A man will be fiercely indignant at an accusation that happens to be false, who did the very thing last week, and is ready to do it again.
— from A Rough Shaking by George MacDonald

See I.P.L. Bussell (F. W.) , D.D., Fellow and Vice-Principal of Brasenose College, Oxford.
— from The Substance of Faith Allied with Science (6th Ed.) A Catechism for Parents and Teachers by Lodge, Oliver, Sir

The necessity of hostelers and herbergeours being freemen was due apparently to the survival of the old Saxon law of frank-pledge, which was still in force at the close of the reign of Edward III.
— from The Customs of Old England by F. J. (Frederick John) Snell

His fine, bearded face was deathly pale, and his tall form trembled and shook.
— from A Thorny Path — Volume 10 by Georg Ebers

To put a stop to this, the infamous "Oates" fabrication was brought forward, which destroyed a number of English Catholic families and stifled the voice of humanity in its efforts to befriend the Irish race; and so sudden, universal, and lasting, was the effect of this plot in closing the eyes of all to the claims of the Irish, that when its chief promoter, Shaftesbury, was dragged to the Tower and there imprisoned as a miscreant, and Oates himself suffered a punishment too mild for his villany, nevertheless no one thought of again taking up the cause of the Irish natives.
— from The Irish Race in the Past and the Present by Augustus J. Thébaud

It was a left hand, neither hot nor cold, with rough, bony fingers which dissolved under pressure.
— from The Shadow World by Hamlin Garland