Three other results of these delightful essays are worthy of attention: first, they are the best picture we possess of the new social life of England, with its many new interests; second, they advanced the art of literary criticism to a much higher stage than it had ever before reached, and however much we differ from their judgment and their interpretation of such a man as Milton, they certainly led Englishmen to a better knowledge and appreciation of their own literature; and finally, in Ned Softly the literary dabbler, Will Wimble the poor relation, Sir Andrew Freeport the merchant, Will Honeycomb the fop, and Sir Roger the country gentleman, they give us characters that live forever as part of that goodly company which extends from Chaucer's country parson to Kipling's Mulvaney.
— from English Literature Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English-Speaking World by William J. (William Joseph) Long

Having settled the order of proceeding, and the road to be taken, we started off once more and began to make our way through an ill-favoured Black Hollow, called, less expressively, the American Bottom.
— from American Notes by Charles Dickens

When the time for reconstruction comes, they will want the old political system of caucuses, Legislatures, etc., to amuse them and make them believe they are real sovereigns; but in all things they will follow blindly the lead of the planters.
— from Memoirs of General William T. Sherman — Complete by William T. (William Tecumseh) Sherman

I supposed, as a matter of course, that a fleet of vessels would soon pour in, ready to convey the army to Virginia, and as General Grant's orders contemplated my leaving the cavalry, trains, and artillery, behind, I judged Fort McAllister to be the best place for the purpose, and sent my chief-engineer, Colonel Poe, to that fort, to reconnoitre the ground, and to prepare it so as to make a fortified camp large enough to accommodate the vast herd of mules and horses that would thus be left behind.
— from Memoirs of General William T. Sherman — Complete by William T. (William Tecumseh) Sherman

When one contemplates all this from the point of view of art alone one cannot but be grateful that the supreme office of the Church should be the playing of the tragedy without the shedding of blood: the mystical presentation, by means of dialogue and costume and gesture even, of the Passion of her Lord; and it is always a source of pleasure and awe to me to remember that the ultimate survival of the Greek chorus, lost elsewhere to art, is to be found in the servitor answering the priest at Mass.
— from De Profundis by Oscar Wilde

Centauri, Lapithæque, et Tantalus, atque Prometheus, Et Nephele, veluti nube soluta suâ,— Hi pereunt omnes; alterque laboribus ipse Conficis Alcides Hercule majus opus.
— from A New System; or, an Analysis of Antient Mythology. Volume I. by Jacob Bryant

When both thought that their wordy warfare had continued long enough to allay any suspicions that they were in collusion, the driver of the market cart, first giving St. Just a wink that was almost imperceptible, moved forward for a few yards, then deliberately drew round his horse so that it and the cart behind it stood crosswise in the street and blocked it.
— from For Love of a Bedouin Maid by Voleur

In the hour of his death, on August 14th, the Duke drew a codicil leaving everything to Alfonso.
— from The End of the Middle Ages: Essays and Questions in History by A. Mary F. (Agnes Mary Frances) Robinson

Kicking against the sides with the toes of my boots, I managed to make holes in the hard clay, large enough to allow of my resting my feet sufficiently to take off some of the strain from my fingers and arms.
— from The Wide World Magazine, Vol. 22, No. 132, March, 1909 by Various

The day following the Embassy dinner Talaat gave the Billings party a luncheon at the Cercle d’Orient, and he insisted that Enver should leave his wedding ceremony long enough to attend this function.
— from Secrets of the Bosphorus by Henry Morgenthau

“I'll show you the theater next,” said he, as he led the way out of the temple with Mrs. Bowser giving her views of the picturesque heathen in questions that Corson found no break in the conversation long enough to answer.
— from Blindfolded by Earle Ashley Walcott

To this we reply: the miracles on which the gospel was founded, or propagated, were of the most extraordinary kind; they were of extensive publicity, and of ocular notoriety; they were vastly numerous, extending to the infirmed of all descriptions; and they were continued long enough to answer the purpose for which they were intended.
— from A Series of Letters, in Defence of Divine Revelation In Reply to Rev. Abner Kneeland's Serious Inquiry into the Authenticity of the Same. To Which is Added, a Religious Correspondence, Between the Rev. Hosea Ballou, and the Rev. Dr. Joseph Buckminster and Rev. Joseph Walton, Pastors of Congregational Churches in Portsmouth, N. H. by Hosea Ballou

He was too well acquainted with the roughest parts of the neighbouring mountains, and too indifferent to danger, to be disturbed at this circumstance; he therefore followed his flying foe with so much impetuosity that he completely lost every track and mark with which he Page 382 was acquainted.
— from The History of Sandford and Merton by Thomas Day