“But if, on the contrary, a thing established by law is not really useful for the social relations, then it is not just; and if that which was just, inasmuch as it was useful, loses this character, after having been for some time considered so, it is not less true that, during that time, it was really just, at least for those who do not perplex themselves about vain words, but who prefer, in every case, examining and judging for themselves.
— from The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers by Diogenes Laertius

They may fail in emergencies; but life is not one long emergency: it is mostly a string of situations for which no exceptional strength is needed, and with which even rather weak people can cope if they have a stronger partner to help them out.
— from Pygmalion by Bernard Shaw

Coroll.), both in so far as he has the idea of the human body, and in so far as he has the ideas of the given external bodies. Let it now be granted, that the human body is affected by an external body through that, which it has in common therewith, namely, A; the idea of this modification will involve the property A (II. xvi.), and therefore (II.
— from Ethics by Benedictus de Spinoza

Variety, then, forms a part of enjoyment; but let it not be supposed that the admission of this fact—derived, as we derive it, from the works of God himself—can ever have a tendency to produce evil, to generate the licentious desire of multiplying and changing pleasures, or to create the fickle and fluttering inconstancy which ranges dissatisfied from object to object.
— from Corse de Leon; or, The Brigand: A Romance. Volume 1 (of 2) by G. P. R. (George Payne Rainsford) James

And even Bianciardino liked it not.
— from Renaissance in Italy, Volume 4 (of 7) Italian Literature, Part 1 by John Addington Symonds

even such rigours could not check his ambition to “barb,” and as his brother had explained how necessary it was that he should be complete master of Englishy before landing in Nuova Yorka if he hoped to escape being “plucked” (great business of illuminating gestures of rapacity) he employed in guiding Americans such brief hours as he could snatch from school.
— from Seekers in Sicily: Being a Quest for Persephone by Jane and Peripatetica by Anne Hoyt

It will be sufficient to observe that exportation by land is not forbidden, and that no bonds being required from vessels ostensibly employed in the coasting-trade, nor any authority vested by law which will justify detention, those vessels daily sail for British ports without any other remedy but the precarious mode of instituting prosecutions against the apparent owners.
— from The Life of Albert Gallatin by Henry Adams

When to this I add that it was composed of basaltic rocks and received the deposit of such an extent of elevated basaltic land I need scarcely add that it was highly fertile.
— from Journals of Two Expeditions of Discovery in North-West and Western Australia, Volume 1 by Grey, George, Sir

In Virginia the Episcopal Church was supported by legislative authority; and it was favored, though not established by law, in New York.
— from Outlines of Universal History, Designed as a Text-book and for Private Reading by George Park Fisher

To know Italian belles lettres , is not to know Italy, and to know English belles lettres is not to know England.
— from Selections from the Prose Works of Matthew Arnold by Matthew Arnold

Mr. Kruger's appointment expired by law in November 1877, and the Government did not think it advisable to re-employ him.
— from The Last Boer War by H. Rider (Henry Rider) Haggard