I emerged into full manhood, with the ruins of some ideals about me, but with others planted above the stars; scarred and a bit grim, but hugging to my soul the divine gift of laughter and withal determined, even unto stubbornness, to fight the good fight.
— from Darkwater: Voices from Within the Veil by W. E. B. (William Edward Burghardt) Du Bois

Some vaulters like a long run, and depend entirely upon speed to carry them over the bar, while others take a short sprint, and throw all their force and energy into the leap.
— from Harper's Round Table, May 5, 1896 by Various

I flatter myself, when I am safely housed under marble, the world will place a different estimate upon some things I shall leave behind to challenge criticism.”
— from Vashti; Or, Until Death Us Do Part by Augusta J. (Augusta Jane) Evans

"I suppose you did 'em up?" said the latter to his more fortunate brother.
— from Cattle-Ranch to College: The True Tales of a Boy's Adventures in the Far West by Russell Doubleday

No doubt, Ecelino used such things, and many worse, of which even the ingenuity of Signor P—— cannot conceive.
— from The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 20, No. 117, July, 1867 A Magazine of Literature, Science, Art, and Politics by Various

This deliverance tamed our ill-disposed Englishmen for a great while; the sight had filled them with horror, and the consequences appeared terrible to the last degree, especially upon supposing that some time or other they should fall into the hands of those creatures, who would not only kill them as enemies, but for food, as we kill our cattle; and they professed to me that the thoughts of being eaten up like beef and mutton, though it was supposed it was not to be till they were dead, had something in it so horrible that it nauseated their very stomachs, made them sick when they thought of it, and filled their minds with such unusual terror, that they were not themselves for some weeks after.
— from The Further Adventures of Robinson Crusoe by Daniel Defoe