"As to governing them well," said Sancho, "there's no need of charging me to do that, for I'm kind-hearted by nature, and full of compassion for the poor; there's no stealing the loaf from him who kneads and bakes;' and by my faith it won't do to throw false dice with me; I am an old dog, and I know all about 'tus, tus;' I can be wide-awake if need be, and I don't let clouds come before my eyes, for I know where the shoe pinches me; I say so, because with me the good will have support and protection, and the bad neither footing nor access.
— from Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Have some confidence in me, for I have succeeded to some extent in my study of the law, according to the verdict of my examinations, for I know the difference between the question put and the question pending, for I have sustained a thesis in Latin upon the manner in which torture was administered at Rome at the epoch when Munatius Demens was quæstor of the Parricide; because I am going to be a doctor, apparently it does not follow that it is absolutely necessary that I should be an imbecile.
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

The effect of this severity was such, that, as the vulgar expressed it, 'the rush-bush kept the cow,' and 'thereafter was great peace and rest a long time, wherethrough the King had great profit; for he had ten thousand sheep going in the Ettrick Forest in keeping by Andrew Bell, who made the king as good count of them as they had gone in the bounds of Fife' (Pitscottie's History, p. 153).
— from The Lady of the Lake by Walter Scott

In our own cases we need no examples, for I know of no inference which was not made in the following fashion: “The situation was so in a hundred cases, it must be so in this case.”
— from Criminal Psychology: A Manual for Judges, Practitioners, and Students by Hans Gross

Indeed, in Greece, wherever an eternal fire is kept up, as at Delphi and Athens, it is not maidens, but widows, past the age to wed, that tend it.
— from Plutarch's Lives, Volume 1 (of 4) by Plutarch

2 Welcome are all earth's lands, each for its kind, Welcome are lands of pine and oak, Welcome are lands of the lemon and fig, Welcome are lands of gold, Welcome are lands of wheat and maize, welcome those of the grape, Welcome are lands of sugar and rice, Welcome the cotton-lands, welcome those of the white potato and sweet potato, Welcome are mountains, flats, sands, forests, prairies, Welcome the rich borders of rivers, table-lands, openings, Welcome the measureless grazing-lands, welcome the teeming soil of orchards, flax, honey, hemp; Welcome just as much the other more hard-faced lands, Lands rich as lands of gold or wheat and fruit lands, Lands of mines, lands of the manly and rugged ores, Lands of coal, copper, lead, tin, zinc, Lands of iron—lands of the make of the axe.
— from Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman

For a while he watched it sinking in the deep clear water; then sprang up and danced for joy, and again fell upon his knees and thanked Heaven, with tears in his eyes, for its kindness in taking away his only plague, the ugly heavy stone.
— from Grimms' Fairy Tales by Wilhelm Grimm

As for the fruit towards those that are within, it is peace, which containeth infinite blessings; it establisheth faith; it kindleth charity; the outward 68 peace of the church distilleth into peace of conscience, and it turneth the labors of writing and reading of controversies into treatises of mortification and devotion.
— from Bacon's Essays, and Wisdom of the Ancients by Francis Bacon

Mr. Tudor's uncle had married an English lady who was third cousin to a living lord, and Amy regarded the whole family with great respect; for, in spite of her American birth and breeding, she possessed that reverence for titles which haunts the best of us,—that unacknowledged loyalty to the early faith in kings which set the most democratic nation under the sun in a ferment at the coming of a royal yellow-haired laddie, some years ago, and which still has something to do with the love the young country bears the old, like that of a big son for an imperious little mother, who held him while she could, and let him go with a farewell scolding when he rebelled.
— from Little Women; Or, Meg, Jo, Beth, and Amy by Louisa May Alcott

And this was a sore drawback to the pleasure I experienced, for I knew her to be proud and haughty beyond most women, or even men; and also that she was of so active and inquisitive a turn of mind, that she would endeavour to obtain all power and authority unto herself,
— from Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine - Volume 55, No. 344, June, 1844 by Various

I will never be able to write one that tells of dark deeds and treacherous doings and love-sick lovers, or one which has suspended interest or rapid action and narrow escapes, for I know very little of such things, and I will never do much with plots.
— from Kitty Canary: A Novel by Kate Langley Bosher

To the People, about to exercise the electoral franchise, in choosing a Chief Magistrate of the Republic, I appeal, to vindicate the electoral franchise in Kansas.
— from Charles Sumner: his complete works, volume 05 (of 20) by Charles Sumner

The approach of a corn, as all who ever felt it know, commences with a slight inflammatory smart on the prominent part of the little toe; then comes on the excessive burning, the throbbing, the stabbing: “a little longer, yet a little longer;” and then the point of the tack begins to enter, the outer skin is penetrated, the next membrane becomes inflamed, and, from the delicate “network” of the {102} rete mucosum, an increased quantity of secretion is poured out: gradually a substance is formed, hard, horny, and with a sharp point, that descends deeper and deeper into the foot, until not unfrequently it reaches and enters the blood-vessels and very joints themselves.
— from The Book of the Feet: A History of Boots and Shoes by Joseph Sparkes Hall

Trussing .—Pigeons, to be good, should be eaten fresh (if kept a little, the flavour goes off), and they should be drawn as soon as killed.
— from The Book of Household Management by Mrs. (Isabella Mary) Beeton

I hoped that Sandy and the other men had escaped, for I knew that they also, if they had strength sufficient, would not return home without endeavouring to discover what had become of me.
— from Snow Shoes and Canoes Or, The Early Days of a Fur-Trader in the Hudson Bay Territory by William Henry Giles Kingston

Mr. Tudor's uncle had married an English lady who was third cousin to a living lord, and Amy regarded the whole family with great respect, for in spite of her American birth and breeding, she possessed that reverence for titles which haunts the best of us—that unacknowledged loyalty to the early faith in kings which set the most democratic nation under the sun in ferment at the coming of a royal yellow-haired laddie, some years ago, and which still has something to do with the love the young country bears the old, like that of a big son for an imperious little mother, who held him while she could, and let him go with a farewell scolding when he rebelled.
— from Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

I said little at your precious enquiry, for I knew that you were all in the interest of Sir John Toppys, your owner.
— from Madame Gilbert's Cannibal by Bennet Copplestone

“My excellent friend, to be candid with you,” she began, “there is no need of your generosity at present, to relieve my son from any embarrassments; for I know that he has no debts whatever.
— from Tales and Novels — Volume 05 Tales of a Fashionable Life by Maria Edgeworth