When the magician retaliates by saying that the spiritually conscientious one could have understood little of his song, the latter replies: “Thou praisest me in that thou separatest me from thyself.”
— from Thus Spake Zarathustra: A Book for All and None by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

But since the reign of Philip and Mary, the denomination of the English coin has undergone little or no alteration, and the same number of pounds, shillings, and pence, have contained very nearly the same quantity of pure silver.
— from An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith

Master Bates, apparently much delighted with his commission, took the cleft stick: and led Oliver into an adjacent kitchen, where there were two or three of the beds on which he had slept before; and here, with many uncontrollable bursts of laughter, he produced the identical old suit of clothes which Oliver had so much congratulated himself upon leaving off at Mr. Brownlow's; and the accidental display of which, to Fagin, by the Jew who purchased them, had been the very first clue received, of his whereabout. 'Put off the smart ones,' said Charley, 'and I'll give 'em to Fagin to take care of.
— from Oliver Twist by Charles Dickens

The simple shrewdness of Joseph Hooper, combined with a certain hitherto unconfessed lack of respect for the Golden Rule, to say nothing of a vain-glorious desire to kick the world that had kicked him, soon produced opportunities that paved the way for his rehabilitation.
— from Mr. Bingle by George Barr McCutcheon

He must have left his money box here one day, closed the place up and then came his unfortunate loss of mind, after he was hurt.
— from The Moving Picture Girls at Oak Farm or, Queer Happenings While Taking Rural Plays by Laura Lee Hope

I covered her up, looked once into her eyes and felt the restlessness of fatigue over-power me so that I wanted to stagger out, walk straight before me, stagger on and on till I dropped.
— from The Arrow of Gold: A Story Between Two Notes by Joseph Conrad

This having been duly effected, and the bill carefully placed on the file, Mrs. Thomas also sat down, and commenced her usual lamentation over the state of her nerves, and the extravagance of the younger members of the family.
— from The Garies and Their Friends by Frank J. Webb

It does not seem difficult to conceive how unintentional ludicrosities of this nature, introduced into ecclesiastical erections in ages too little critical to distinguish between what the workman had purposed doing and what he had done, might come to be regarded, in a less earnest but more knowing age, as precedents for the introduction of the intentionally comic and grotesque.
— from The Cruise of the Betsey or, A Summer Ramble Among the Fossiliferous Deposits of the Hebrides. With Rambles of a Geologist or, Ten Thousand Miles Over the Fossiliferous Deposits of Scotland by Hugh Miller

The archduchess Elizabeth, aunt to the present emperor of Austria, who was so much beloved that the people of Vienna always called her Unsere Liese , ( Our Bess ) took a particular fancy to milk with her own hands the beautiful cows which she had collected at Schönbrunn.
— from Austria containing a Description of the Manners, Customs, Character and Costumes of the People of that Empire by Frederic Shoberl

Mrs. Mompesson administered daily to her husband’s suffering parishioners until death closed her useful life, on the 24th August, 1666.
— from Old Church Lore by William Andrews

As Schmucke’s character, his utter lack of ambition or pretence became known, the orchestra recognized him as one of themselves; and as time went on, he was intrusted with the often needed miscellaneous musical instruments which form no part of the regular band of a boulevard theatre.
— from The Works of Balzac: A linked index to all Project Gutenberg editions by Honoré de Balzac

I once offended the tenant, Nicolson, by fining him for cheating his unhappy labourers, on the abominable truck system; and he had rather poison me than do anything to oblige me.
— from The Daisy Chain, or Aspirations by Charlotte M. (Charlotte Mary) Yonge