That would not only be cruel, and everyone would blame me, but it would be stupid on my part.” “Piotr, call a coach; I am going to Petersburg,” he said to his servant.
— from Anna Karenina by Tolstoy, Leo, graf

Heaven is too small a reward for it; they make choice of times and meats, buy and sell their merits, attribute more to them than to the ten Commandments, and count it a greater sin to eat meat in Lent, than to kill a man, and as one sayeth, Plus respiciunt assum piscem, quam Christum crucifixum, plus salmonem quam Solomonem, quibus in ore Christus, Epicurus in corde , pay more respect to a broiled fish than to Christ crucified, more regard to salmon than to Solomon, have Christ on their lips, but Epicurus in their hearts, when some counterfeit, and some attribute more to such works of theirs than to Christ's death and passion; the devil sets in a foot, strangely deludes them, and by that means makes them to overthrow the temperature of their bodies, and hazard their souls.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

In character, a country is as good as its supposedly best, and bad as its worst citizens, the influence of the former of whom, when employed to misdirect wealth and mislead authority, is the most pernicious menace to national character and longevity.
— from Criminal Types by V. M. (Vincent Myron) Masten

Liquor Pancreatini (Liq. Pancreat.), Solution of Pancreatin, N.F. (Liquor Pancreaticus, N.F. III, Pancreatic Solution).—Pancreatin (1.75%), sodium bicarbonate (5%), with compound spirit of cardamom, sodium chloride and chloroform in alcohol, glycerin and water.
— from Epitome of the Pharmacopeia of the United States and the National Formulary With Comments by William August Puckner

This man, who was formerly a groom in a rich household, had ended by marrying La Cognette, a cook in a good family.
— from The Works of Balzac: A linked index to all Project Gutenberg editions by Honoré de Balzac

In one of these solitary excursions she met with a little black cub and captured it, and, gathering it up in her apron like a kitten, she ran with it toward her cabin, after looking behind to see if the mother bear was following her.
— from The Log School-House on the Columbia by Hezekiah Butterworth

To be able to clear away clouds is a great thing.
— from The Ivory Gate, a new edition by Walter Besant

After she was gone, Eva threw herself upon the bed, regardless of the piles of clothing already covering it, and gave way to a fit of weeping which seemed to do her good, for she sat up, and with a long sigh began to tidy up, which she had told Vava she was doing, though it certainly had not looked like it.
— from A City Schoolgirl and Her Friends by May Baldwin

He convened a congress, instituted a government, and issued a proclamation abolishing slavery in Venezuela; almost fifty years before the famous Emancipation Proclamation of Lincoln.
— from The History of Cuba, vol. 2 by Willis Fletcher Johnson

But to-day two ravens came and cawed in a gentle, soothing, confident manner just outside the window before we got up: this gave the Skipper great belief in the turn of luck, and he started with a rope in his pocket to tie up the deerskins withal, his knife sharpened like a razor, and his bag full of cartridges.
— from Three in Norway, by Two of Them by Walter J. Clutterbuck

"I have often thought," said Mr. Stanley, "of sending him Dr. Barlow's three sermons on industry in our calling as Christians, industry as gentlemen, and industry as scholars ; which sermons, by the way, I intended to have made my son read at least once a year, had he lived, that he might see the consistency, the compatibility, nay, the analogy of the two latter with the former.
— from Coelebs In Search of a Wife by Hannah More