It is the duty of statesmen to form a federative union as it was formerly the duty of individuals to enter the state.
— from Perpetual Peace: A Philosophical Essay by Immanuel Kant

One can only guess that the original material of his speech was perhaps the surly Kerry brogue; but the degradation of speech that occurs in London, Glasgow, Dublin and big cities generally has been at work on it so long that nobody but an arrant cockney would dream of calling it a brogue now; for its music is almost gone, though its surliness is still perceptible.
— from Man and Superman: A Comedy and a Philosophy by Bernard Shaw

The expressions which issued the most readily from the mouth of the emperor of the West were, "Strike off his head;" "Burn him alive;" "Let him be beaten with clubs till he expires;" and his most favored ministers soon understood, that, by a rash attempt to dispute, or suspend, the execution of his sanguinary commands, they might involve themselves in the guilt and punishment of disobedience.
— from The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Table of Contents with links in the HTML file to the two Project Gutenberg editions (12 volumes) by Edward Gibbon

There was plenty to talk about on those short winter days when the animals found themselves round the fire; still, the Mole had a good deal of spare time on his hands, and so one afternoon, when the Rat in his arm-chair before the blaze was alternately dozing and trying over rhymes that wouldn't fit, he formed the resolution to go out by himself and explore the Wild Wood, and perhaps strike up an acquaintance with Mr. Badger.
— from The Wind in the Willows by Kenneth Grahame

Yet, Fanny, do not imagine I would now speak disrespectfully of Sir Thomas, though I certainly did hate him for many a week.
— from Mansfield Park by Jane Austen

Before I had reached Savannah, and during our stay there, the rebel officers and newspapers represented the conduct of the men of our army as simply infamous; that we respected neither age nor sex; that we burned every thing we came across--barns, stables, cotton-gins, and even dwelling-houses; that we ravished the women and killed the men, and perpetrated all manner of outrages on the inhabitants.
— from Memoirs of General William T. Sherman — Complete by William T. (William Tecumseh) Sherman

I do not see them, and therefore the distinctions of figure, colour, and the like, which enable me to discern the differences of some things, do not apply to them.
— from The Republic of Plato by Plato

“Now, sir,” says he to Tom, “you just jump down, and I'll give you a drop of something to keep the cold out.”
— from Tom Brown's School Days by Thomas Hughes

The batteries must then either be replaced, or a delay of some three hours must occur while they are being recharged.
— from Twentieth Century Inventions: A Forecast by George Sutherland

The friend whom we meet, the woman who approaches and smiles, the love that unlocks our heart, the death or sorrow that seals it, the September sky above us, this superb and delightful garden, wherein we see, as in Corneille's 'Psyche,' bowers of greenery resting on gilded statues, and the flocks grazing yonder, with their shepherd asleep, and the last houses of the village, and the sea between the trees,—all these are raised or degraded before they enter within us, are adorned or despoiled, in accordance with the little signal this choice of ours makes to them.
— from The Life of the Bee by Maurice Maeterlinck

"There comes Emerson first, whose rich words, every one, Are like gold nails in temples to hang trophies on, Whose prose is grand verse, while his verse, the Lord knows, Is some of it pr—— No, 'tis not even prose; I'm speaking of metres; some poems have welled From those rare depths of soul that have ne'er been excelled; They 're not epics, but that doesn't matter a pin, In creating, the only hard thing 's to begin;
— from Poems of James Russell Lowell With biographical sketch by Nathan Haskell Dole by James Russell Lowell

After an interval of a month, Senator Albert J. Hopkins, of Illinois, undertook to reply with a defense of Smoot that reduced the Apostle's excuses to the absurd.
— from Under the Prophet in Utah; the National Menace of a Political Priestcraft by Frank J. Cannon

Presiding at his own table, talking to a tenant at the cover-side, discussing the last opera with the fair Duchess of Darlington, or smoking the peaceful midnight cigar with an old comrade, the Squire of Dene seemed to be, and really was, equally happy, natural, and at home .
— from Barren Honour: A Novel by George A. (George Alfred) Lawrence

It was no wonder Chepstow could not turn its tongue about that name; that and his manner together must have dumfounded our straight-thinking townspeople.
— from McClure's Magazine, Vol 31, No 2, June 1908 by Various

Born and bred though they had been at the mill in the great forest that covered almost the whole of the district of Sauveterre, they were no true children of the mill.
— from In the Days of Chivalry: A Tale of the Times of the Black Prince by Evelyn Everett-Green

FROM THE PERPETUAL DICTATORSHIP OF SYLLA TO THE TRIUMVIRATE OF CÆSAR, POMPEY, AND CRASSUS.—U.C. 680.
— from Pinnock's improved edition of Dr. Goldsmith's History of Rome to which is prefixed an introduction to the study of Roman history, and a great variety of valuable information added throughout the work, on the manners, institutions, and antiquities of the Romans; with numerous biographical and historical notes; and questions for examination at the end of each section. By Wm. C. Taylor. by Oliver Goldsmith

"The Scourge of the West" For one long, awful week I had lain a prisoner in that foul den, when at length, on the third day of September, the roll of drums and blare of trumpets told us that Lord Chief Justice Jeffreys was come into the town to hold assize.
— from The Black Box: A Tale of Monmouth's Rebellion by W. Bourne Cooke