and, doubtless, it was embellished with many rare seeds of virtue, lively, natural, and not put on; he was singularly sober; so far from being delicate in his diet, that Oppius relates, how that having one day at table set before him medicated instead of common oil in some sauce, he ate heartily of it, that he might not put his entertainer out of countenance.
— from Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Complete by Michel de Montaigne

And have we not decided that our rulers must neither be so uneducated as to have no fixed rule of life, nor so over-educated as to be unwilling to leave their paradise for the business of the world?
— from The Republic of Plato by Plato

Even normal individuals often have a passionate love for odors that are either indifferent or disgusting to others (rotten apples, wet sponges, cow-dung, and the odor of a horse-stable, garlic, assafoetida, very ripe game, etc.).
— from Criminal Psychology: A Manual for Judges, Practitioners, and Students by Hans Gross

“Divinabit” seems preferable here to “damnabit,” or “demonstrabit,” the other readings; and Burmann is probably right in supposing that he means to say that many of the Æsopian fables had not yet been used by him, and though others may make use of them as bearing a general moral, they will not be able so well as himself to point their moral in reference to individuals or classes, in consequence of his advantage in having already adapted many of them to the censure of particular vices.
— from The Fables of Phædrus Literally translated into English prose with notes by Phaedrus

Her understanding, courage, and presence of mind, became powerful auxiliaries to him in the difficult task of ruling the tumultuous crowd, which were subjected to his control, in truth by a single hair.
— from The Last Man by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

To what purpose shall I walk among these trees if there is nothing left now of the assembly that used to meet beneath the delicate tracery of reddening leaves, if vulgarity and fatuity have supplanted the exquisite thing that once their branches framed?
— from Swann's Way by Marcel Proust

About midway down the outside rank, a shrouded figure was sitting upright, wagging its head slowly from one side to the other—a grisly spectacle!
— from Life on the Mississippi by Mark Twain

He ate of his meal sparingly, and with evident disgust, the only remarks which dropped from him were— “You make bad bread in the bush.
— from Roughing It in the Bush by Susanna Moodie

It is clear that objective significancy cannot consist in a relation to another representation (of that which we desire to term object), for in that case the question again arises: “How does this other representation go out of itself, and obtain objective significancy over and above the subjective, which is proper to it, as a determination of a state of mind?”
— from The Critique of Pure Reason by Immanuel Kant

Since then, he had persecuted her for walks on deck, secured for her white violets, at vast expense, from some one who was taking them out in the ship's ice-box for sale in London; had sent to her table daily tokens of regard, from pats of choice butter, bunches of black Hamburg grapes, and broiled birds, to Southern "pin-money" pickles.
— from Latter-Day Sweethearts by Harrison, Burton, Mrs.

What care I for thy carelessness? I give from depths that overflow, Regardless that their power to bless Thy spirit cannot sound or know.
— from The Home Book of Verse — Volume 2 by Burton Egbert Stevenson

Thus it is through all the Asiatic provinces, and the further I went the more convinced did I become that European Turkey is the head and brains of the empire, and that if the difficult task of reform is to be carried out in Asia it can only be done from western Turkey.
— from Amurath to Amurath by Gertrude Lowthian Bell

"Pay no attention to her." "'What great events from trivial causes spring!' as the poet says: you may live to bless the day that old Roger crossed our doors." "As how?" says Barbara, laughing, and rocking herself backward and forward in a veteran American rocking-chair which, at different periods of our history, has served most of us the dirty turn of tipping us over, and presenting us reversed to the eyes of our family.
— from Nancy: A Novel by Rhoda Broughton

Now, sir, I presume it to be well known, that in the best legends extant of the times of Richard I. and John, this identical Matilda, or Maud Fitzwater, is chronicled as the chère amie and companion of the outlawed Robert Fitzooth, earl of Huntingdon, whom, as “Robin Hood,” she followed as “ Maid Marian;” and with whom, on his restoration to his honours by king Richard, (to his earldom and estates,) she intermarried, and became countess of Huntingdon, and was in every respect a wife, though we have no records whether she ever became a mother; and that when by king John the earl was again outlawed, and driven to the wilds of Sherwood forest, his countess also again shared his misfortunes, and a second time took the name of “ Maid Marian,” (then rather a misnomer,) as he did that of “ Robin Hood .”
— from The Every-day Book and Table Book. v. 3 (of 3) Everlasting Calerdar of Popular Amusements, Sports, Pastimes, Ceremonies, Manners, Customs and Events, Incident to Each of the Three Hundred and Sixty-five Days, in past and Present Times; Forming a Complete History of the Year, Month, and Seasons, and a Perpetual Key to the Almanac by William Hone

Although January is the coolest and pleasantest month of the year, it proved the most disastrous; the outbreak reached its climax on the 15th and 16th, on which days 344 and 345 fatal attacks were recorded.
— from General Gatacre The Story of the Life and Services of Sir William Forbes Gatacre, K.C.B., D.S.O., 1843-1906 by Gatacre, Beatrix Wickens Davey, Lady

The older ones square-danced in the middle of the hall and we younger ones waltzed and polkaed in a long line down the outside ring.
— from Land of the Burnt Thigh by Edith Eudora Kohl

In the morning when the storm was past and the sun shone hotly Tamboosa called the Council of the captains together, and consulted with them as to whether they should follow after the people of Mafooti who had fled, and destroy them, or return straight to Zululand.
— from The Ghost Kings by H. Rider (Henry Rider) Haggard

A story is told of a clergyman from the east travelling down the Ohio River, some years ago, who was anxious to learn something about Mike Fink.
— from The Underground World: A mirror of life below the surface by Thomas Wallace Knox

And thus they are thrown back upon themselves—upon a defective type of religion, a narrow range of intellect and knowledge, a stunted sense of beauty, a low standard of manners.
— from Selections from the Prose Works of Matthew Arnold by Matthew Arnold