They are apt to be rendered uncomfortable by comets and eclipses, and if a dog howls dolefully at night it is looked upon as a sure sign of death in the place.
— from The Sketch-Book of Geoffrey Crayon by Washington Irving

We came in at that door and now it is locked.
— from Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

And now it is like the roll of an army marching slowly through terrific defiles; and now it is like the quiet song of royal wanderers meditating in vast garden landscapes, with mossy masonry and long pools and cypresses, and a sapphire star shining in the purple sky on the shoulder of a cypress; and now it is like the cry of a lost traveller, who, plunging heavily through a virgin forest, comes suddenly upon a green circular sward, smooth as a carpet, with an antique statue of a beautiful nude girl in the midst; and now it is like the oratory of richly-gowned philosophers awaiting death in gorgeous and gloomy palaces; and now it is like the upward rush of winged things that are determined to achieve, knowing well the while that the ecstasy of longing is better than the assuaging of desire.
— from Sacred and Profane Love: A Novel in Three Episodes by Arnold Bennett

We derive a new interest in life from the hope that the future may provide us with an answer to this query.
— from Perkins, the Fakeer: A Travesty on Reincarnation His wonderful workings in the cases of "When Reginald was Caroline", "How Chopin came to Remsen", and "Clarissa's troublesome baby" by Edward S. (Edward Sims) Van Zile

But it is not lawful to curse the devil, as neither is it lawful to curse oneself; for it is written (Ecclus. 21:30): "While the ungodly curseth the devil, he curseth his own soul."
— from Summa Theologica, Part II-II (Secunda Secundae) Translated by Fathers of the English Dominican Province by Thomas, Aquinas, Saint

She discovers a new interest in life and in the last novel of the season.
— from Modern Women and What is Said of Them A Reprint of A Series of Articles in the Saturday Review (1868) by E. Lynn (Elizabeth Lynn) Linton

An important feature of the book is the illustrations, which comprise some full page plates in colour from Mr. Bentley’s watercolour drawings, and numerous illustrations in line and from photographs, besides many plans.
— from Robin Linnet by E. F. (Edward Frederic) Benson

"I like and admire the Battle extremely," he said in a letter on its publication, sent me by Dickens and not included in Lord [304] Cockburn's Memoir.
— from The Life of Charles Dickens, Vol. I-III, Complete by John Forster