General Scott’s suggestion of such danger to Mr. Buchanan, in the month of October, 1860, and the impracticable advice which he then gave, if it had been published before the election, would have been laughed at by every Republican statesman in the country, or would have been indignantly treated as a work of supererogation, unnecessarily suggesting that the election of the Republican candidate was to be followed by an attempted disruption of the Union.
— from Life of James Buchanan, Fifteenth President of the United States. v. 2 (of 2) by George Ticknor Curtis

Why is a round body, like a ball, easily rolled about the floor?
— from First Lessons in Natural Philosophy for Beginners by Joseph C. (Joseph Comly) Martindale

The King, the Dukes of Massachusetts and Virginia, the Marquises of Connecticut and Mohawk, Earl Susquehanna and Lord Livingston, would have been laughed at by every ragamuffin.
— from The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 2, No. 14, December 1858 A Magazine of Literature, Art, and Politics by Various

Lady Delafield is one of the women of fashion who shine by their own light; Lady Haughton shines by borrowed light, and borrows every ray she can find.”
— from A Strange Story — Complete by Lytton, Edward Bulwer Lytton, Baron

You are evidently in the dark in practical acquaintance with Popery, and I hesitate not to tell you now, that until you unite with me heart and hand in my efforts to extirpate it from this country, you will be laughed at by every Romish priest and Bishop in the United States; well knowing, as they do, that while you are converting one Italian to Protestantism, they are converting five hundred Americans to Popery; and that while you are distributing one little tract, which one Italian in a thousand,—even if he could, would not read,—they are building one hundred colleges, nunneries, and monk houses, in your very midst, and at your very doors.
— from Auricular Confession and Popish Nunneries Volumes I. and II., Complete by William Hogan

Lady Delafield is one of the women of fashion who shine by their own light; Lady Haughton shines by borrowed light, and borrows every ray she can find."
— from A Strange Story — Volume 03 by Lytton, Edward Bulwer Lytton, Baron