He was supposed to have died in battle, but ten days afterwards his body was found untouched by corruption and sent home for burial.
— from The Republic by Plato

What do I behold but satiety and indifference?
— from The Sorrows of Young Werther by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe

This made the Roman general despair of taking the city by their want of necessaries, and to betake himself again to arms, and to try to force them to surrender, which was what the Jews greatly desired; for as they despaired of either themselves or their city being able to escape, they preferred a death in battle before one by hunger and thirst.
— from The Wars of the Jews; Or, The History of the Destruction of Jerusalem by Flavius Josephus

Now if talking and writing were of themselves sufficient to make men good, they would justly, as Theognis observes have reaped numerous and great rewards, and the thing to do would be to provide them: but in point of fact, while they plainly have the power to guide and stimulate the generous among the young and to base upon true virtuous principle any noble and truly high-minded disposition, they as plainly are powerless to guide the mass of men to Virtue and goodness; because it is not their nature to be amenable to a sense of shame but only to fear; nor to abstain from what is low and mean because it is disgraceful to do it but because of the punishment attached to it: in fact, as they live at the beck and call of passion, they pursue their own proper pleasures and the means of securing them, and they avoid the contrary pains; but as for what is noble and truly pleasurable they have not an idea of it, inasmuch as they have never tasted of it.
— from The Ethics of Aristotle by Aristotle

The head seizes the tail with its teeth, and the tail defends itself bravely by stinging the head: the battle may last for half an hour, until they die or are dragged away by other ants.
— from The World as Will and Idea (Vol. 1 of 3) by Arthur Schopenhauer

For just as, so long as his knowledge was directed to life as such, he was obliged to recognise immortality in it, so when death is brought before his eyes, he is obliged to recognise it as that which it is, the temporal end of the particular temporal phenomenon.
— from The World as Will and Idea (Vol. 1 of 3) by Arthur Schopenhauer

For the super-structures on the pent-houses had the appearance and style of towers, owing to the placing of the wattles side by side; and the space between looked like a wall, because the row of wattles at the top of the covered way were divided into battlements by the fashion in which they were woven.
— from The Histories of Polybius, Vol. 1 (of 2) by Polybius

The noble son on sinewy feet advancing, I saw, out of the land of prairies, land of Ohio's waters and of Indiana, To the rescue the stalwart giant hurry his plenteous offspring, Drest in blue, bearing their trusty rifles on their shoulders.
— from Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman

There's no news at the court, sir, but the old news; that is, the old Duke is banished by his younger brother the new Duke; and three or four loving lords have put themselves into voluntary exile with him, whose lands and revenues enrich the new Duke; therefore he gives them good leave to wander.
— from The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare

No matter how discolored it becomes by weathering and the accumulation of foreign substances, a vigorous application of soap, water, and a scrubbing brush will whiten it.
— from American Forest Trees by Henry H. Gibson

Spring comes and the ice is breaking, Does it break before its time?
— from Verses and Rhymes By the Way by Norah

The work of carrying out the maimed and dead immediately began, but it was a task of big proportions, as many bodies were totally buried under the debris.
— from The True Story of Our National Calamity of Flood, Fire and Tornado by Logan Marshall

He claimed all sorts of sea service and seemed to know what he was talking about, posed even my expert friends with the sailing-ship question: What’s the difference in build between a Scotch ship, a Nova Scotian, and a Yankee?
— from The Bonadventure: A Random Journal of an Atlantic Holiday by Edmund Blunden

If for the first few days March [1878] seemed inclined to emulate the peaceful calm and sunshine of its predecessor, it very suddenly assumed a more warlike aspect; a change came over the spirit of its dream; it became boisterous and rude; snow, and sleet, and rain, and storm battling in wild comminglement.
— from Nether Lochaber The Natural History, Legends, and Folk-lore of the West Highlands by Stewart, Alexander, Rev.

Speaking a vitiated German with a facility which seems to be the heirloom of the tribe of Judah, they discussed music, and with a familiarity also characteristic of the race they told Wagner they were going to spend a few days in Boulogne before proceeding to Paris.
— from Wagner as I Knew Him by Ferdinand Praeger

At last I lay down in bed, but the good man and the bad man quarrelled so all the night in my heart that I had no peace, so I felt obliged to bring you back your money.'
— from Chatterbox, 1905. by Various

But he did not understand that this very feeling no longer needed to disguise itself; because, by self-renunciation, it had become purified and transfigured.
— from A Twofold Life by Wilhelmine von Hillern

Wraxall dined with Hanbury, the English consul, on September 28, and among the company present were several Danes, including Baroness Bülow, Baron and Baroness Schimmelmann and M. le Texier, who had been treasurer to Christian VII.
— from A Queen of Tears, vol. 2 of 2 Caroline Matilda, Queen of Denmark and Norway and Princess of Great Britain and Ireland by W. H. (William Henry) Wilkins

Fool then or no fool, not one single word In the whole string of lies did I believe, But this—this only—if I choke, who cares?— I believe somehow in your purity Perfect as ever!
— from The Complete Poetic and Dramatic Works of Robert Browning Cambridge Edition by Robert Browning