In order, therefore, to diminish their influence by every means in his power, he restored the trophies erected in honour of Caius Marius, on account of his victories over Jugurtha, the Cimbri, and the Teutoni, which had been demolished by Sylla; and when sitting in judgment upon murderers, he treated those as assassins, who, in the late proscription, had received money from the treasury, for bringing in the heads of Roman citizens, although they were expressly excepted in the Cornelian laws.
— from The Lives of the Twelve Caesars, Complete by Suetonius

As with Fedallah the day before, so Ahab was now found grimly clinging to his boat’s broken half, which afforded a comparatively easy float; nor did it so exhaust him as the previous day’s mishap.
— from Moby Dick; Or, The Whale by Herman Melville

some Concerning the proper and particular constitution of man? H2 anchor V. Tragedies were at first brought in and instituted, to put men in mind of worldly chances and casualties: that these things in the ordinary course of nature did so happen: that men that were much pleased and delighted by such accidents upon this stage, would not by the same things in a greater stage be grieved and afflicted: for here you see what is the end of all such things; and that even they that cry out so mournfully to Cithaeron, must bear them for all their cries and exclamations, as well as others.
— from Meditations by Emperor of Rome Marcus Aurelius

So now the vines are fettered, now the trees Let go the sickle, and the last dresser now Sings of his finished rows; but still the ground Must vexed be, the dust be stirred, and heaven Still set thee trembling for the ripened grapes.
— from The Georgics by Virgil

The silver polishing of perfection in huge houses is done by such an expert that no one can tell whether a fork has that moment been sent from the silversmiths or not.
— from Etiquette by Emily Post

To say he hath seen a Vision, or heard a Voice, is to say, that he hath dreamed between sleeping and waking: for in such manner a man doth many times naturally take his dream for a vision, as not having well observed his own slumbering.
— from Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes

In both these, to be graceful, it is requisite that there be no appearance of difficulty; there is required a small inflection of the body; and a composure of the parts in such a manner, as not to incumber each other, not to appear divided by sharp and sudden angles.
— from The Works of the Right Honourable Edmund Burke, Vol. 01 (of 12) by Edmund Burke

At a first glance it looks most unbrahminically uncommercial, but I am not disturbed, being soothed and tranquilized by their reputation.
— from Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World by Mark Twain

Men ought to find the difference between saltness and bitterness.
— from Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern, English and Foreign Sources Including Phrases, Mottoes, Maxims, Proverbs, Definitions, Aphorisms, and Sayings of Wise Men, in Their Bearing on Life, Literature, Speculation, Science, Art, Religion, and Morals, Especially in the Modern Aspects of Them by Wood, James, Rev.

But we must go from among our oppressors; it never can be done by staying among them.
— from The Condition, Elevation, Emigration, and Destiny of the Colored People of the United States by Martin Robison Delany

Centuries passed, and lives were wasted in these discoveries; but step after step was chronicled and marked, and became the guide to the few who alone had the hereditary privilege to track their path.
— from Zanoni by Lytton, Edward Bulwer Lytton, Baron

Disputes between Spotswood and the Burgesses.
— from History of the Colony and Ancient Dominion of Virginia by Charles Campbell

The great movement of social reform during the nineteenth century, we thus see, has moved in four stages, each of which has reinforced rather than replaced that which went before: (1) the effort to cleanse the gross filth of cities and to remedy obvious disorder by systematic attention to scavenging, drainage, the supply of water and of artificial light, as well as by improved policing; (2) the great system of factory legislation for regulating the conditions of work, and to some extent restraining the work of women and of children; (3) the introduction of national systems of education, and the gradual extension of the idea of education to cover far more than mere instruction; and (4), most fundamental of all and last to appear, the effort to guard the child before the school age, even at birth, even before birth, by bestowing due care on the future mother.
— from The Task of Social Hygiene by Havelock Ellis

While "that dear, handsome boy" and his men on the platform were discoursing Beethoven, Schubert and Wagner, the ladies swapped gossip, recipes and lamented the scarcity of skillful, loyal but inexpensive domestics.
— from The World's Great Men of Music: Story-Lives of Master Musicians by Harriette Brower

[THOMAS draws the door back stealthily an inch or so.]
— from Complete Plays of John Galsworthy by John Galsworthy

He had taken the Pope’s advice in this one particular, to get married without waiting for the Divorce; but soon afterwards (April 5th)
— from A History of the Reformation (Vol. 2 of 2) by Thomas M. (Thomas Martin) Lindsay