But, unfortunately, neutrality is not only inwardly difficult, it is also outwardly unrealizable, where our relations to an alternative are practical and vital.
— from The Will to Believe, and Other Essays in Popular Philosophy by William James

That the Macedonian or Bactrian Greeks were most usually intended is not only probable from their position and relations with India, but from their being usually named in concurrence with the north-western tribes, Kámbojas, Daradas, Páradas, Báhlíkas, Śakas &c., in the Rámáyaṇa.
— from The Rámáyan of Válmíki, translated into English verse by Valmiki

In short he left me in such a condition that I have been until now in a hospital getting cured of the injuries which that rascally clown inflicted on me then; for all which your worship is to blame; for if you had gone your own way and not come where there was no call for you, nor meddled in other people’s affairs, my master would have been content with giving me one or two dozen lashes, and would have then loosed me and paid me what he owed me; but when your worship abused him so out of measure, and gave him so many hard words, his anger was kindled; and as he could not revenge himself on you, as soon as he saw you had left him the storm burst upon me in such a way, that I feel as if I should never be a man again.” “The mischief,” said Don Quixote, “lay in my going away; for I should not have gone until I had seen thee paid; because I ought to have known well by long experience that there is no clown who will keep his word if he finds it will not suit him to keep it; but thou rememberest, Andres, that I swore if he did not pay thee I would go and seek him, and find him though he were to hide himself in the whale’s belly.” “That is true,” said Andres; “but it was of no use.”
— from The History of Don Quixote, Volume 1, Complete by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Behold us now in our frail tenement, hemmed in by hungry, roaring waves, buffeted by winds.
— from The Last Man by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

“You seem to be unwell, now I look at you.
— from Project Gutenberg Compilation of 233 Short Stories of Chekhov by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

Many of the sacred terms could not be understood, nor interpreted; they were however
— from A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume I. by Jacob Bryant

Our "Palæphatus" and other Extracts in the Græca Minora were translated by us, not into English, but into Latin, in which language all the notes and elucidations of difficulties in that book were given.
— from Toronto of Old Collections and recollections illustrative of the early settlement and social life of the capital of Ontario by Henry Scadding

Letters, manuscripts, books, and bundles can be passed in there; and, as each nation has a key, it will be uncommonly nice, I fancy.
— from Little Women; Or, Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy by Louisa May Alcott

But until now it had been uncertain regarding Isaac's twin-sons whether that blessing belonged to both or only to one of them; and if to one, which of them it was.
— from The City of God, Volume II by Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Hippo

And to it we set again, as we had now recovered our breath: victory for a long time hovered between us, now inclining to the one and now to the other; we had both lost our footing once or twice, and the spectators would have had us leave off; but excited as we were, it was impossible—we stopped not for their exclamations.
— from Confessions of a Thug by Meadows Taylor

“The gentleman who found Jacksonville a settlement of a few shanties, and who came so near passing a romantic but uncomfortable night in the woods with his wife and the Seminole girl, told me the {50} story of his adventure a few days ago, while I sat with him in his gorgeous private car, so far down in the State of Florida that, in 1853, few white men had reached it.
— from The Life of Henry Bradley Plant Founder and President of the Plant System of Railroads and Steamships and Also of the Southern Express Company by G. Hutchinson (George Hutchinson) Smyth

The material prosperity of a population estimated at thirty millions, which has made a garden of Eden of this volcanic soil, and had grown in numbers and in wealth by unaided native industry.
— from The Englishman in China During the Victorian Era, Vol. 2 (of 2) As Illustrated in the Career of Sir Rutherford Alcock, K.C.B., D.C.L., Many Years Consul and Minister in China and Japan by Alexander Michie

Turkey and Andrew, however, had had the foresight to bring spades with them and a rope, and they set to work at once, my father taking a turn now and then, and I holding the lantern, which was all but useless now in the moonlight.
— from Ranald Bannerman's Boyhood by George MacDonald

There had been nothing in that brief, unsatisfactory note intimating that he was expected to leave Eden Village, but he was quite sure that his departure would be the best thing for all concerned.
— from The Lilac Girl by Ralph Henry Barbour

The offending nuns were promised forgiveness if they would continue their ghostly amusement, and also affect demoniacal possession; a fraud in which they were more readily induced to participate by an assurance that it might be the humble means of converting the heretics—Protestants being unusually numerous in that part of the country.
— from The Superstitions of Witchcraft by Howard Williams

Fearful that the words ‘lawless love’ may frighten simple readers, Mr. Buxton Forman (who thinks Shelley ‘might have been the Saviour of the World’), in his most useful edition of Shelley’s works, appends to the alarming words this note:—‘The words lawless love seem to be used, not in a conventional sense, but merely to signify unshackled love .’
— from The Real Shelley. New Views of the Poet's Life. Vol. 2 (of 2) by John Cordy Jeaffreson

An exhilarating prospect lay before us; nowhere in British seas could such aggregations of wildfowl be seen, nor so favourable a spot be found: there was no tide or current to fight against, no deeps where one loses bottom, no hidden shoals nor shifting sand-banks to bar one's course; and, as too often happens in our tidal waters at home, to snatch success from one's grasp in the very moment of its realization.
— from Wild Spain (España agreste) Records of Sport with Rifle, Rod, and Gun, Natural History Exploration by Abel Chapman

[32] born at one birth, unequal neither in age nor strength.
— from The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 by Livy