A republic presupposes self-denial and a virtuous people; it cannot endure long in our selfish and luxurious days.
— from The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt, 1725-1798. Complete by Giacomo Casanova

[3295] for when once they have got a haunt of such companies, and habit of gaming, they can hardly be drawn from it, but as an itch it will tickle them, and as it is with whoremasters, once entered, they cannot easily leave it off: Vexat mentes insania cupido , they are mad upon their sport.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

This story was told me by the lady herself, in perfectly correct English, learnt in one of the white settlements of New Guinea, where she had been brought up in the house of a leading missionary.
— from Argonauts of the Western Pacific An Account of Native Enterprise and Adventure in the Archipelagoes of Melanesian New Guinea by Bronislaw Malinowski

It is perhaps a law of nature that when a species (or group) fits itself to a place not previously occupied, and in which it is subject to no opposition from beings of its own class, or where it attains so great a perfection as to be able easily to overcome all opposition, the character eventually loses its original plasticity, or tendency to vary, since improvement in such a case would be superfluous, and becomes, so to speak, crystallized in that form which continues thereafter unaltered.
— from The Naturalist in La Plata by W. H. (William Henry) Hudson

"Nec ante ad consules ... famam ejus cladis perlatam, quam in conspectu fuere Gallorum equites pectoribus equorurn suspensa gestantes capita, et lanceis infixa ovantesque moris sui carmine."
— from Notes and Queries, Number 44, August 31, 1850 by Various

Les différents syndrômes cliniques et les indications opératoires, Presse méd., May 10, July 8, Aug. 30, 1915.
— from Shell-Shock and Other Neuropsychiatric Problems Presented in Five Hundred and Eighty-nine Case Histories from the War Literature, 1914-1918 by Elmer Ernest Southard

If they try to contact me, you can either listen in or try to blow them up, and me with them!"
— from The Invaders by Murray Leinster

For notwithstanding all this noise of Erecting 141 Statues, and the great danger in plucking them down, &c. yet in P. 89, 'tis said that even Sir William shewed Choler enough, leaving it open for others, thereby to understand, that he was wholly given over to Passion and Choler.
— from The Witchcraft Delusion in New England: Its Rise, Progress, and Termination (Vol. 3 of 3) by Robert Calef

He was twice Speaker of the House between 1660 and 1671, and as presiding officer he could exert less influence on measures of expediency than any other person present, as he could not argue either for or against them.
— from The Life and Genius of Nathaniel Hawthorne by Frank Preston Stearns

The secret of the Gospel is not solved by saying that Christ excites love in our souls.
— from Expositions of Holy Scripture Ezekiel, Daniel, and the Minor Prophets. St. Matthew Chapters I to VIII by Alexander Maclaren

But while the Lewis and Clarke expedition largely increased our knowledge of the country, and added to the strength of our title, it did not definitely settle any disputed question.
— from Twenty Years of Congress, Vol. 1 From Lincoln to Garfield, with a Review of the Events Which Led to the Political Revolution of 1860 by James Gillespie Blaine