The barrier was close at hand.
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

But we can’t have things perfect in this imperfect world, as Mrs. Lynde says.
— from Anne of Green Gables by L. M. (Lucy Maud) Montgomery

The little kingdom of Bosphorus, whose capital was situated on the Straits, through which the Maeotis communicates itself to the Euxine, was composed of degenerate Greeks and half-civilized barbarians.
— 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

By the middle of the nineteenth century Brazil was contributing twice as much to the world's commerce as her nearest competitor, the Dutch East Indies, exports in 1852–53 being 2,353,563 bags from Brazil and 1,190,543 bags from the Dutch East Indies.
— from All About Coffee by William H. (William Harrison) Ukers

He comes to it for the first time—all that he has been reading of it all his life, and that the most enthusiastic part of life,—all he has gathered from narratives of wandering seamen; what he has gained from true voyages, and what he cherishes as credulously from romance and poetry; crowding their images, and exacting strange tributes from expectation.—He thinks of the great deep, and of those who go down unto it; of its thousand isles, and of the vast continents it washes; of its receiving the mighty Plata, or Orellana, into its bosom, without disturbance, or sense of augmentation; of Biscay swells, and the mariner For many a day, and many a dreadful night, Incessant labouring round the stormy Cape; of fatal rocks, and the "still-vexed Bermoothes;" of great whirlpools, and the water-spout; of sunken ships, and sumless treasures swallowed up in the unrestoring depths: of fishes and quaint monsters, to which all that is terrible on earth— Be but as buggs to frighten babes withal, Compared with the creatures in the sea's entral; of naked savages, and Juan Fernandez; of pearls, and shells; of coral beds, and of enchanted isles; of mermaids' grots— I do not assert that in sober earnest he expects to be shown all these wonders at once, but he is under the tyranny of a mighty faculty, which haunts him with confused hints and shadows of all these; and when the actual object opens first upon him, seen (in tame weather too most likely) from our unromantic coasts—a speck, a slip of sea-water, as it shows to him—what can it prove but a very unsatisfying and even diminutive entertainment?
— from The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb — Volume 2 Elia and The Last Essays of Elia by Charles Lamb

To burn without ceasing to fly,—therein lies the marvel of genius.
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

They also seized in his cell a half-empty bottle which contained the remains of the stupefying wine with which the soldier had been drugged.
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

It gives the hunter a chance to tell where the trail doubled, and which way the deer was going, It is more realistic, and the boy who can follow this skillfully can follow a living deer.
— from Boy Scouts Handbook The First Edition, 1911 by Boy Scouts of America

And although the existence of an ideal aristocracy is slenderly proven from the remains of early Greek history, and we have a difficulty in ascribing such a character, however the idea may be defined, to any actual Hellenic state—or indeed to any state which has ever existed in the world—still the rule of the best was certainly the aspiration of philosophers, who probably accommodated a good deal their views of primitive history to their own notions of good government.
— from The Republic of Plato by Plato

But who could the other one be.
— from Hawk's Nest; or, The Last of the Cahoonshees. A Tale of the Delaware Valley and Historical Romance of 1690. by James M. (James Martin) Allerton

In some places these enthusiastic warriors continue to hide themselves—from others they are escorted to the place of their destination by nearly an equal number of dragoons; and no one, I believe, who can procure money to pay a substitute, is disposed to go himself.
— from A Residence in France During the Years 1792, 1793, 1794 and 1795, Complete Described in a Series of Letters from an English Lady: with General and Incidental Remarks on the French Character and Manners by Charlotte Biggs

Placide had been with Christophe all day, and was the means by which the household had been assured of the tranquillity of the neighbourhood.
— from The Hour and the Man, An Historical Romance by Harriet Martineau

Biology zoölogical and biology botanical being commended in the Bible, and the study being necessary to the fullest interpretation of the Bible, we commend our legal friend to a little more biblical study.
— from The Chautauquan, Vol. 04, December 1883 by Chautauqua Institution

The remainder of the liver was crowded back into the hole, and the boy was carried off.
— from Pawnee Hero Stories and Folk-Tales With notes on the origin, customs and character of the Pawnee people by George Bird Grinnell

All doubts, however, soon came to an end; for the poor brute lay down, and before we could reach the spot, had died,—the ball had passed through its body.
— from What I Saw in Kaffir-Land by Stephen Lakeman

Everything was forgotten and silenced by the compelling voice of his blood, which cried out that he loved her.
— from The Trampling of the Lilies by Rafael Sabatini

But a party it could not help being: quietly and spontaneously it had grown to be what community of ideas, aims, and sympathies, naturally, and without blame, leads men to become.
— from The Oxford Movement; Twelve Years, 1833-1845 by R. W. (Richard William) Church

Then, where we are all hidden behind the pavilion, we see the fun, and after it's over and the kid has bolted, we can take the skin back."
— from The Human Boy Again by Eden Phillpotts