“Please—” “My only consolation was that you found people more to your taste, and were often able to leave me at home.
— from A Room with a View by E. M. (Edward Morgan) Forster

Is it not just that I should now enjoy a life of ease and tranquillity?" Hindbad drew near, and kissing his hand respectfully, replied, "Sir, you have indeed known fearful perils; my troubles have been nothing compared to yours.
— from The Arabian Nights Entertainments by Andrew Lang

The cove was fined in the steel for pear making; the fellow was imprisoned in the house of correction for taking bounties from different regiments.
— from 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue by Francis Grose

But there will be so much difficulty in disputing with them at every town on the road that it is not for poor men to do it or undertake it, at such a time as this is especially.
— from A Journal of the Plague Year Written by a Citizen Who Continued All the While in London by Daniel Defoe

After these leaders there were judges, when the people were settled in the land of promise, so that, in the meantime, the first promise made to Abraham began to be fulfilled about the one nation, that is, the Hebrew, and about the land of Canaan; but not as yet the promise about all nations, and the whole wide world, for that was to be fulfilled, not by the observances of the old law, but by the advent of Christ in the flesh, and by the faith of the gospel.
— from The City of God, Volume II by Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Hippo

Butler, as is well known, distinguishes self-love, or the impulse towards our own pleasure, from “particular movements towards particular external objects—honour, power, the harm or good of another”; the actions proceeding from which are “no otherwise interested than as every action of every creature must from the nature of the case be; for no one can act but from a desire, or choice, or preference of his own.”
— from The Methods of Ethics by Henry Sidgwick

In Scotland, more than one fifth, perhaps more than one third part of the whole lands in the country, are at present supposed to be under strict entail.
— from An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith

A young man, who had the ordering of things, took the circuit of the table two or three times, and finally pointed me to a seat at the lower end of it.
— from Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, Written by Herself by Harriet A. (Harriet Ann) Jacobs

I had another incorrigible borrower in the person of old Betty B——. This Betty was unlike the rest of my Yankee borrowers; she was handsome in her person, and remarkably civil, and she asked for the loan of everything in such a frank, pleasant manner, that for some time I hardly knew how to refuse her.
— from Roughing It in the Bush by Susanna Moodie

At the same time, it is necessary when tests are made, to depend upon general, and rarely constant impressions, since very few people mean the same thing by, stinging, prickly, metallic, and burning tastes, even though the ordinary terms sweet, sour, bitter, and salty, may be accepted as approximately constant.
— from Criminal Psychology: A Manual for Judges, Practitioners, and Students by Hans Gross

This fancy pleased my thoughts for some weeks; and I was so full of it, that I often dreamed of it, and sometimes that I was just going to let fly at them in my sleep.
— from The Life and Adventures of Robinson Crusoe of York, Mariner, Volume 1 With an Account of His Travels Round Three Parts of the Globe, Written By Himself, in Two Volumes by Daniel Defoe

After he took off, I sat in the dome over the telephone connection to Tom and hated myself for picking Monroe to do the job.
— from Project Hush by William Tenn

He spoke of needing a shower and was twice on the point of departure when my good fairy prompted me to mention the winning of the Hemmingway Cup.
— from Fore! by Charles E. (Charles Emmett) Van Loan

Avarice is satirized by the story of one of these Glonglims, who is occupied in making nails, and then dropping them into a well—refusing to exchange them for bread or clothes, notwithstanding his starved, haggard appearance, and evident desire for the food proffered:— "Mettant toute sa gloire et son souverain bien A grossir un trésor qui ne lui sert de rien."
— from A Voyage to the Moon With Some Account of the Manners and Customs, Science and Philosophy, of the People of Morosofia, and Other Lunarians by George Tucker

I am here wounded and a prisoner because I foolishly permitted myself to be so.
— from John Brown: An Address at the 14th Anniversary of Storer College by Frederick Douglass

There Study shall with Solitude recline, And Friendship pledge me to his fellow–swains; And Toil and Temperance sedately twine The slender cord that fluttering life sustains: And fearless Poverty shall guard the door, And Taste unspoiled the frugal table spread, And Industry supply the frugal store, [150] And Sleep unbribed his dews refreshing shed; White–mantled Innocence, ethereal sprite, Shall chase afar the goblins of the night, And Independence o’er the day preside: Propitious power!
— from Tobias Smollett by William Henry Oliphant Smeaton

Licinius Stolo is condemned on a law which he himself had carried, for possessing more than five hundred acres of land.
— from The History of Rome, Books 01 to 08 by Livy

"You may say I will give that to the people who have got it," replied Henry, "and fifty pounds more to whichever of these so-called bankers gets it for me."
— from The Forgery; or, Best Intentions. by G. P. R. (George Payne Rainsford) James

Flowering period, May to July. Gentiana Asclepiadea.
— from Hardy Perennials and Old Fashioned Flowers Describing the Most Desirable Plants, for Borders, Rockeries, and Shrubberies. by J. G. (John George) Wood