My dreams, when life first opened to me, My dreams, when the hopes of youth beat high, Were to see thy lov’d face, O gem of the Orient sea, From gloom and grief, from care and sorrow free; No blush on thy brow, no tear in thine eye Dream of my life, my living and burning desire, All hail!
— from Lineage, Life and Labors of José Rizal, Philippine Patriot by Austin Craig

Baldhead over the blind.
— from Ulysses by James Joyce

Was not Minerva born of the brain, even through the ear of Jove?
— from Gargantua and Pantagruel by François Rabelais

And when our discourse was brought to that point, that the very highest delight of the earthly senses, in the very purest material light, was, in respect of the sweetness of that life, not only not worthy of comparison, but not even of mention; we raising up ourselves with a more glowing affection towards the "Self-same," did by degrees pass through all things bodily, even the very heaven whence sun and moon and stars shine upon the earth; yea, we were soaring higher yet, by inward musing, and discourse, and admiring of Thy works; and we came to our own minds, and went beyond them, that we might arrive at that region of never-failing plenty, where Thou feedest Israel for ever with the food of truth, and where life is the Wisdom by whom all these things are made, and what have been, and what shall be, and she is not made, but is, as she hath been, and so shall she be ever; yea rather, to "have been," and "hereafter to be," are not in her, but only "to be," seeing she is eternal.
— from The Confessions of St. Augustine by Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Hippo

Charles noticed that at the bottom of the basin there was a sort of white sediment sticking to the sides of the porcelain.
— from Madame Bovary by Gustave Flaubert

A great empire has been established for the sole purpose of raising up a nation of customers, who should be obliged to buy, from the shops of our different producers, all the goods with which these could supply them.
— from An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith

Here are still to be seen stately porticos; imposing staircases; offices roomy as the state apartments in palaces—deserted, or thinly peopled with a few straggling clerks; the still more sacred interiors of court and committee rooms, with venerable faces of beadles, door-keepers—directors seated in form on solemn days (to proclaim a dead dividend,) at long worm-eaten tables, that have been mahogany, with tarnished gilt-leather coverings, supporting massy silver inkstands long since dry;—the oaken wainscots hung with pictures of deceased governors and sub-governors, of queen Anne, and the two first monarchs of the Brunswick dynasty;—huge charts, which subsequent discoveries have antiquated;—dusty maps of Mexico, dim as dreams,—and soundings of the Bay of Panama!—The long passages hung with buckets, appended, in idle row, to walls, whose substance might defy any, short of the last, conflagration;—with vast ranges of cellarage under all, where dollars and pieces of eight once lay, an "unsunned heap," for Mammon to have solaced his solitary heart withal,—long since dissipated, or scattered into air at the blast of the breaking of that famous BUBBLE.— Such is the SOUTH-SEA HOUSE.
— from The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb — Volume 2 Elia and The Last Essays of Elia by Charles Lamb

“Why, I’ve got a friend that’s going into this yer branch of the business—wants to buy up handsome boys to raise for the market.
— from Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe

If therefore they pretended no right to appoint their successors, I think I may reasonably conclude, they had no right to appoint the new power; which none could take from the Church to bestow on them, but such as had a lawfull authority, not onely to Teach, but to Command the Church; which none could doe, but the Civill Soveraign.
— from Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes

He broke Grandpa Dearborn's shaving-mug, and spilled the lather all over himself and the lavender bows of the best pin-cushion.
— from Big Brother by Annie F. (Annie Fellows) Johnston

Next insert the pointed end of a leg wire in the bottom of the foot and pass it up along the back of the bone between it and the skin.
— from Home Taxidermy for Pleasure and Profit A Guide for Those Who Wish to Prepare and Mount Animals, Birds, Fish, Reptiles, etc., for Home, Den, or Office Decoration by Albert Burton Farnham

Ground-color of the wings and tail brown, like the bars of the back; middle and secondary wing-coverts with roundish transverse spots of nearly pure white on lower webs; lesser coverts plain rich brown; secondaries crossed by six bands of pale grayish-brown, passing into paler on the edge of each feather,—the last is terminal, passing narrowly into whitish; primary coverts with four bands of darker ochraceous-brown; primaries with transverse series of quadrate pale-brown spots on the outer webs (growing deeper in tint on inner quills), the last terminal; on the longest are about eight.
— from A History of North American Birds; Land Birds; Vol. 3 of 3 by Robert Ridgway

A few fires were burning in the ravines back of the banks, around which the men took turns in warming themselves, as they munched their frugal fare from the haversacks.
— from For Love of Country: A Story of Land and Sea in the Days of the Revolution by Cyrus Townsend Brady

The “Buy, buy, what’ll you buy?” of the butchers, is one of the last remains in London of this custom.
— from The History of Signboards, from the Earliest times to the Present Day by John Camden Hotten

It resembled an axe with an exaggerated handle, only the back of the blade was prolonged into a formidable spike, while the handle extended beyond into a species of spear-point.
— from The Queen Against Owen by Allen Upward

At the beginning of this business, we declare that a due regard should be had to the Western Territory; he now tells us, as an argument in favor of the Senate's amendment, that we should have no regard to it at all.
— from Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856, Vol. 1 (of 16) by United States. Congress

The basement of the building contains the dinner-room, of ample dimensions, to receive the guests, who at the sound of a gong rush in, and in a few minutes have finished their repast.
— from Diary in America, Series Two by Frederick Marryat

I think our whole army likes you, you belle of the Boer aristocracy.
— from War's Brighter Side The Story of The Friend Newspaper Edited by the Correspondents with Lord Roberts's Forces, March-April, 1900 by Julian Ralph

The brave but venal warrior, highly incensed at thus learning the manner in which his conduct was estimated by men of such high rank in the royal service, was near breaking off the bargain.
— from The Rise of the Dutch Republic — Complete (1555-84) by John Lothrop Motley