When the asas at length tried to speak, the wailing so choked their voices that one could not describe to the other his sorrow.
— from The Younger Edda; Also called Snorre's Edda, or The Prose Edda by Snorri Sturluson

If you would care to verify the incident, pray do so.
— from The Importance of Being Earnest: A Trivial Comedy for Serious People by Oscar Wilde

Man depends on things for his experience, yet by automatic action he changes these very things so that it becomes possible that by his action he should promote his welfare.
— from The Life of Reason: The Phases of Human Progress by George Santayana

The wagon-load which headed the line had struck up a song, and were shouting at the top of their voices with a haggard joviality, a pot-pourri by Desaugiers, then famous, called The Vestal ; the trees shivered mournfully; in the cross-lanes, countenances of bourgeois listened in an idiotic delight to these coarse strains droned by spectres.
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

I shall take care not to polish Emile’s judgment so far as to transform it, and when he has acquired discernment enough to feel and compare the varied tastes of men, I shall lead him to fix his own taste upon simpler matters.
— from Emile by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Whenever these persons of high distinction condescend to visit the public baths, they assume, on their entrance, a tone of loud and insolent command, and appropriate to their own use the conveniences which were designed for the Roman people.
— from The Satyricon — Complete by Petronius Arbiter

For it seems to me impossible that they should endeavour to conform their voices to notes (as it is plain they do) of which they had no ideas.
— from An Essay Concerning Humane Understanding, Volume 1 MDCXC, Based on the 2nd Edition, Books 1 and 2 by John Locke

127.]—for that was his name, returned answer, that it was not for fear of him, or of any man living, that he did so, but that it was the way of marching in practice with his nation, who had neither tilled fields, cities, nor houses to defend, or to fear the enemy should make any advantage of but that if he had such a stomach to fight, let him but come to view their ancient places of sepulture, and there he should have his fill.
— from Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Complete by Michel de Montaigne

give Troubled me, to see the confidence of the vice of the age Trumpets were brought under the scaffold that he not be heard Turn out every man that will be drunk, they must turn out all Two shops in three, if not more, generally shut up Uncertainty of all history Uncertainty of beauty Unless my too-much addiction to pleasure undo me Unquiet which her ripping up of old faults will give me Up, leaving my wife in bed, being sick of her months Up, and with W. Hewer, my guard, to White Hall Up, my mind very light from my last night’s accounts Up early and took my physique; it wrought all the morning well Up, finding our beds good, but lousy; which made us merry Up and took physique, but such as to go abroad with Upon a very small occasion had a difference again broke out Upon the leads gazing upon Diana Upon a small temptation I could be false to her Used to make coal fires, and wash my foul clothes Venison-pasty that we have for supper to-night to the cook’s Very high and very foule words from her to me Very angry we were, but quickly friends again Very great tax; but yet I do think it is so perplexed Vexed at my wife’s neglect in leaving of her scarf Vexed me, but I made no matter of it, but vexed to myself Vices of the Court, and how the pox is so common there Voyage to Newcastle for coles
— from The Diary of Samuel Pepys — Complete by Samuel Pepys

The inmates of our convents of men and women voluntarily consecrate their virginity to God.
— from The Faith of Our Fathers by James Gibbons

After the execution of Charles I. in 1649, and the setting up of the Puritan Commonwealth, many of the royalists, or Cavaliers, as they were called, came to Virginia to escape the obnoxious Puritan rule.
— from History of American Literature by Reuben Post Halleck

It would have been a relief to him to speak; to reduce to words, or, indeed, to definite consciousness, the vague trouble that oppressed him; but its outlines were too large and too vague for him.
— from A Valiant Ignorance; vol. 2 of 3 A Novel in Three Volumes by Mary Angela Dickens

How could they visit them?
— from Edmund Dulac's Fairy-Book: Fairy Tales of the Allied Nations by Edmund Dulac

Work on this was begun in 1890, and it is now completed to Vladivostok, the chief [Pg 318] Russian port on the Pacific, a traveller being able to ride from St. Petersburg to the shores of the Pacific Ocean without change of cars.
— from Historic Tales: The Romance of Reality. Vol. 08 (of 15), Russian by Charles Morris

To commemorate this victory they put on the old bridge at the upper town a clock provided with an iron head, that slowly put out and drew in a long tongue of derision.
— from Time and Clocks: A Description of Ancient and Modern Methods of Measuring Time by Cunynghame, Henry H. (Henry Hardinge), Sir

* * * * * * * * * * "Oh, doubly blest, who then can trusting view The buoyant step, the vigour-beaming hue; And love's fond cares recall'd, with joy divine Can whisper to his heart,—That work is mine!
— from The Legendary and Poetical Remains of John Roby author of 'Traditions of Lancashire', with a sketch of his literary life and character by John Roby

I believe there is a way, and a very easy way, out of the entire trouble, and it is this: I do not care whether the electors first meet in their respective States or not, but I want the Constitution so amended that the electors of all the States shall meet on a certain day in the city of Washington, and count the votes themselves; to allow that body to be the judge of who are electors, to allow it to choose a chairman, and to allow the person so chosen to declare who is the President, and who is the Vice-President of the United States.
— from The Works of Robert G. Ingersoll, Complete Contents Dresden Edition—Twelve Volumes by Robert Green Ingersoll

Some intervals between the bad weather occurred on the 18th and 19th, and allowed them, among other things, to send the Etoile's barge, which was in peculiar good condition, to view the channel of Sainte Barbe , about which, however, his information was so scanty and apparently incorrect, at least imperfect, as to prove of little utility in his present situation.
— from A General History and Collection of Voyages and Travels — Volume 13 by Robert Kerr