After the first meal nearly all the steel knives had been missing, and now every Negro had one, ground to a fine point, hidden in his boots.
— from The Jungle by Upton Sinclair

' In the first place, he is thought just, and therefore bears rule in the city; he can marry whom he will, and give in marriage to whom he will; also he can trade and deal where he likes, and always to his own advantage, because he has no misgivings about injustice; and at every contest, whether in public or private, he gets the better of his antagonists, and gains at their expense, and is rich, and out of his gains he can benefit his friends, and harm his enemies; moreover, he can offer sacrifices, and dedicate gifts to the gods abundantly and magnificently, and can honour the gods or any man whom he wants to honour in a far better style than the just, and therefore he is likely to be dearer than they are to the gods.
— from The Republic by Plato

The alcade, or chief judge, was for putting him into the town prison; but this was objected to, particularly by the corregidor, who said, in Spanish, "In order to prevent the knowledge of his confinement from reaching his countrymen, I will take the matter on myself, and be answerable for the consequences;" upon which it was agreed, that he should be confined in the governor's house with the greatest secrecy.
— from Fox's Book of Martyrs Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs by John Foxe

When he is praying for pardon, he is all the while perfectly determined to keep his crown; and he knows it.
— from Shakespearean Tragedy: Lectures on Hamlet, Othello, King Lear, Macbeth by A. C. (Andrew Cecil) Bradley

There are these four things which we should be particularly desirous of in the position of the city with respect to itself: in the first place, health is to be consulted as the first thing necessary: now a city which fronts the east and receives the winds which blow from thence is esteemed most healthful; next to this that which has a northern position is to be preferred, as best in winter.
— from Politics: A Treatise on Government by Aristotle

And now they are taking away the little that remains of his dignity as a householder and the head of a family, promising him instead Utopias which are called (appropriately enough) “Anticipations” or “News from Nowhere.”
— from What's Wrong with the World by G. K. (Gilbert Keith) Chesterton

But she stuck to her point until she wearied a confession out of him: he had been prowling about in disguise, stealing small valuables from private houses; in fact, he made a good deal of a raid on his fellow-villagers a fortnight before, when he was supposed to be in St. Louis; but he doubted if he had sent away enough stuff to realize the required amount, and was afraid to make a further venture in the present excited state of the town.
— from The Tragedy of Pudd'nhead Wilson by Mark Twain

2 In the first place, he is thought just, and therefore bears rule in the city; he can marry whom he will, and give in marriage to whom he will; The unjust who appears just will attain every sort of prosperity.
— from The Republic of Plato by Plato

The priest stooped toward the prostrate Suzanne, raised her to her feet, placed her in a chair, and, taking a hand of each of the sisters, pronounced: “Lord God!
— from Complete Original Short Stories of Guy De Maupassant by Guy de Maupassant

Fresh pitsand, however, in spite of all its excellence in concrete structures, is not equally useful in stucco, the richness of which, when the lime and straw are mixed with such sand, will cause it to crack as it dries on account of the great strength of the mixture.
— from The Ten Books on Architecture by Vitruvius Pollio

The dates assigned by the two chronologers, for the composition of this drama, seem to be inferred from premises highly inconclusive and improbable.
— from Shakspeare and His Times [Vol. 2 of 2] Including the Biography of the Poet; criticisms on his genius and writings; a new chronology of his plays; a disquisition on the on the object of his sonnets; and a history of the manners, customs, and amusements, superstitions, poetry, and elegant literature of his age by Nathan Drake

The girl did not realize that her face proved her innocence.
— from Chicken Little Jane on the Big John by Lily Munsell Ritchie

As he spoke one white poodle came walking along on his hind legs, with his front paws held in a funny fashion before him.
— from The Curlytops and Their Pets; Or, Uncle Toby's Strange Collection by Howard Roger Garis

For Pisa herself is soon lost in the vagueness of a world thus delicately touched by sun and cloud, and seemingly so full of ruinous or deserted things like the beautiful great Church of Settimo, whose tower you may see far away in the golden summer weather standing quite alone in a curve of the river; so that you leave the highway and following a little by-road come upon Pieve di S. Cassiano, a basilica in the ancient Pisan manner set among the trees in a shady place, and over the three doors of the façade you find the beautiful 135 work of Biduino da Pisa, as it is said, sculptures in relief of the resurrection of Lazarus, the entry of Christ into Jerusalem, a fight of dragons, and certain subjects from the Bestiaries.
— from Florence and Northern Tuscany with Genoa With Sixteen Illustrations in Colour by William Parkinson and Sixteen Other Illustrations, Second Edition by Edward Hutton

“In the first place he is about the size of Striped Chipmunk.
— from The Burgess Animal Book for Children by Thornton W. (Thornton Waldo) Burgess

This would, at least, deter Beauman from prosecuting his intended journey to Charleston; it would also give time for farther deliberation, and might so operate on my father’s feelings as to soften that obduracy of temper, which deeply disquieted himself and others, and thus finally be productive of happily effecting the designed purpose.
— from Alonzo and Melissa; Or, The Unfeeling Father: An American Tale by I. (Isaac) Mitchell

He had not forgotten that a wonderful fortune placed him in communication with the very girl whom he desired to meet—the only one who could tell him where to find Leon de Brabant, because she had fled with him and was in all probability his wife.
— from Miss Fairfax of Virginia: A Romance of Love and Adventure Under the Palmettos by St. George Rathborne

In this moment of her fervid passion her Indian nature was all revealed in its hot, tempestuous, unreasoning fury; and the Zillah of this scene was that same Zillah who, years before, had turned away from the bedside of her dying father to utter those maledictions, those taunts, and those bitter insults, which Lord Chetwynde so well remembered.
— from The Cryptogram: A Novel by James De Mille