This cautious and honest fear of the fraternity, lest any Brother should assume the duties of a position which he could not faithfully discharge, and which is, in our time, tantamount to a candidate's advancing to a degree for which he is not prepared, is again exhibited in the charges enacted in the reign of James II., the manuscript of which was preserved in the archives of the Lodge of Antiquity in London.
— from The Principles of Masonic Law A Treatise on the Constitutional Laws, Usages and Landmarks of Freemasonry by Albert Gallatin Mackey

These are those clerks which serve the turn, whom they commonly entertain, and present to church livings, whilst in the meantime we that are University men, like so many hidebound calves in a pasture, tarry out our time, wither away as a flower ungathered in a garden, and are never used; or as so many candles, illuminate ourselves alone, obscuring one another's light, and are not discerned here at all, the least of which, translated to a dark room, or to some country benefice, where it might shine apart, would give a fair light, and be seen over all.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

It was generally considered, indeed, that she had been due some time, and ought to have fallen long ago; but she had kept her life, and her situation, with an ill-conditioned tenacity that occasioned much offence and disappointment.
— from Hard Times by Charles Dickens

In consciousness and for logic, association by similarity, with its aggregations and identifications of recurrences in time, is fundamental rather than association by contiguity and its existential syntheses; for recognition identifies similars perceived in succession, and without recognition of similars there could be no known persistence of phenomena.
— from The Life of Reason: The Phases of Human Progress by George Santayana

Although the daughter of an ugly old Hrim-thurs, Skadi, the goddess of winter, was very beautiful indeed, in her silvery armour, with her glittering spear, sharp-pointed arrows, short white hunting dress, white fur leggings, and broad snowshoes; and the gods could not but recognise the justice of her claim, wherefore they offered the usual fine in atonement.
— from Myths of the Norsemen: From the Eddas and Sagas by H. A. (Hélène Adeline) Guerber

Fly Like a Bird Song of the Banner at Daybreak Rise
— from Leaves of Grass by Walt Whitman

Its beach on the ocean front, more than a mile away, is one of the finest in existence, hard as a floor, level and broad, stretching as far as eye can see, and having a grand surf booming upon it.
— from America, Volume 2 (of 6) by Joel Cook

He settled his head back on his folded forearms like a babe settling its head in a bosom and looked back through the window.
— from Someone Comes to Town, Someone Leaves Town by Cory Doctorow

Poets, pale for long ago, Bring sweet sounds from rock and flood, You by echo's accent know Where the water is and wood.
— from The Complete Poems of Francis Ledwidge with Introductions by Lord Dunsany by Francis Ledwidge

The country, paralyzed with fear, looked anxiously but supinely upon the scientific combat between the two great champions of Despotism and Protestantism which succeeded.
— from PG Edition of Netherlands series — Complete by John Lothrop Motley

I shouted aloud to cheer him up, for I knew what sheep it was, to wit, the most valiant of all the wethers, who had met me when I came home from London, and been so glad to see me.
— from Lorna Doone: A Romance of Exmoor by R. D. (Richard Doddridge) Blackmore

Gall moreover surmised that the faculty of language lay in the frontal lobes, and Bouillaud supported Gall's proposition by citing cases in which speech had been affected during life, and in which after death the frontal lobes were found to be damaged by disease.
— from The Brain and the Voice in Speech and Song by F. W. (Frederick Walker) Mott

My ma said she worked hard in the field like a black stepchild.
— from Slave Narratives: a Folk History of Slavery in the United States From Interviews with Former Slaves Arkansas Narratives, Part 2 by United States. Work Projects Administration