In an excellent parable, Proclus, the Neoplatonist, points out how in every town the mob dwells side by side with those who are rich and distinguished: so, too, in every man, be he never so noble and dignified, there is, in the depth of his nature, a mob of low and vulgar desires which constitute him an animal.
— from The Essays of Arthur Schopenhauer; Counsels and Maxims by Arthur Schopenhauer

"So that if your wife had not died, or had not been killed, you would not now be a widower," said Sancho.
— from Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

No demand of human nature is more urgent or less to be escaped.
— from Democracy and Education: An Introduction to the Philosophy of Education by John Dewey

'Saunders Welch, the Justice, who was once High-Constable of Holborn, and had the best opportunities of knowing the state of the poor, told me, that I under-rated the number, when I computed that twenty a week, that is, above a thousand a year, died of hunger; not absolutely of immediate hunger; but of the wasting and other diseases which are the consequences of hunger.
— from Boswell's Life of Johnson Abridged and edited, with an introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood by James Boswell

And Zotov began telling at great length of his great-niece Glasha, daughter of his niece Katerina, who lived somewhere on a farm.
— from Project Gutenberg Compilation of 233 Short Stories of Chekhov by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

'Yet did I not, as some my equals did, Demand of him, nor being desired yielded; Finding myself in honour so forbid, With safest distance I mine honour shielded.
— from The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare

"No-one will dispute that the General Will is in each individual a pure act of the understanding, which reasons while the passions are silent on what a man may demand of his neighbour and on what his neighbour has a right to demand of him."
— from The Social Contract & Discourses by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

The censure of a bad appointment, on account of the uncertainty of its author, and for want of a determinate object, has neither poignancy nor duration.
— from The Federalist Papers by Alexander Hamilton

And thus, as Mill remarks, Utilitarianism is sometimes attacked from two precisely opposite sides: from a confusion with Egoistic Hedonism it is called base and grovelling; while at the same time it is more plausibly charged with setting up too high a standard of unselfishness and making exaggerated demands on human nature.
— from The Methods of Ethics by Henry Sidgwick

They tempted him as often as he relieved them, as though the declaration of his name to Moses (Exod. xxxiv.), “to be a God gracious, and long‑suffering,” had been intended for no other purpose but a protection of them in their rebellions.
— from The Existence and Attributes of God, Volumes 1 and 2 by Stephen Charnock

The difficulty now consisted in finding out the exact degree of heat necessary for the perfecting of the rubber and the exact length of time required for the heating.
— from Inventors by Philip Gengembre Hubert

They had indeed their sorrows, true and deep, but still, more like children's sorrows than ours, whether bursting into open cry of pain, or hid with shuddering under the veil, still passing over the soul as clouds do over heaven, not sullying it, not mingling with it;—darkening it perhaps long or utterly, but still not becoming one with it, and for the most part passing away in dashing rain of tears, and leaving the man unchanged; in nowise affecting, as our sorrow does, the whole tone of his thought and imagination thenceforward.
— from Modern Painters, Volume 3 (of 5) by John Ruskin

When Honour is a Support to virtuous Principles, and runs parallel with the Laws of God and our Country, it cannot be too much cherished and encouraged: But when the Dictates of Honour are contrary to those of Religion and Equity, they are the greatest Depravations of human Nature, by giving wrong Ambitions and false Ideas of what is good and laudable; and should therefore be exploded by all Governments, and driven out as the Bane and Plague of Human Society.
— from The Spectator, Volumes 1, 2 and 3 With Translations and Index for the Series by Steele, Richard, Sir

the Duke surely will not stain the first day of his new government with blood!"
— from The Banished: A Swabian Historical Tale by Wilhelm Hauff

Evelyn's happiness gave him real satisfaction; and if he were already beginning to be aware that his feeling for her left the innermost depths of his nature unstirred, he never acknowledged the fact.
— from Captain Desmond, V.C. by Maud Diver

Too much confused for immediate speech she returned to her seat at an embroidery frame while the servant placed two chairs, then she drew out her needle and counted some stitches, as if to explain her silence; after which she raised her head, gently yet proudly, in the direction of Monsieur de Chessel as she asked to what fortunate circumstance she owed his visit.
— from The Works of Balzac: A linked index to all Project Gutenberg editions by Honoré de Balzac

It teaches one the depths of human nature.
— from Pearls of Thought by Maturin Murray Ballou

[Pg 113] It had been very hot at one time of the day, but there had been a thunder-shower in the afternoon, which had cooled the air, and given freshness of colouring to the surrounding vegetation, deepening the tints on flower and shrub and tree, while, 'The ling'ring sun seem'd loth to leave Landskip so fair, to gentle eve.' Aunt Mary, though of course she noticed the difference in the dresses of her nieces, said nothing about it; but kept up, as she usually did, a conversation both amusing and instructive.
— from Aunt Mary by Mrs. Perring

In a moment of temporary embarrassment he had been tempted to forge the name of Colonel Dumont to this check, for five hundred dollars, to liquidate a debt of honor, not doubting that he should be able to obtain it again before the day of settlement at the bank, by means of a dissolute teller, a boon companion at the gaming-table.
— from Hatchie, the Guardian Slave; or, The Heiress of Bellevue A Tale of the Mississippi and the South-west by Warren T. Ashton