The crafty Mæsa, sensible that her grandson Elagabalus must inevitably destroy himself by his own vices, had provided another and surer support of her family.
— from The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Table of Contents with links in the HTML file to the two Project Gutenberg editions (12 volumes) by Edward Gibbon

Every one is the child of God—Jesus claims nothing for himself alone—as the child of God each man is the equal of every other man....
— from The Antichrist by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

ANT: Darkness, dimness, obscurity, shade, duskiness, gloom, extinction, misinterpretation, ignorance, misunderstanding, night, death, confusion, mystification, tenebrosity.
— from A Complete Dictionary of Synonyms and Antonyms or, Synonyms and Words of Opposite Meaning by Samuel Fallows

When a Royal Palace is burnt to the Ground, every Man is at Liberty to present his Plan for a new one; and tho' it be but indifferently put together, it may furnish several Hints that may be of Use to a good Architect.
— from The Spectator, Volume 1 Eighteenth-Century Periodical Essays by Steele, Richard, Sir

Get a shirt with all convenient dispatch, that your nakedness may not henceforward give offence to travelling gentlewomen, especially maidens in years.’
— from The Expedition of Humphry Clinker by T. (Tobias) Smollett

The teacher, a grave, elderly man, interfered; then turned his back a moment and Tom pulled a boy’s hair in the next bench, and was absorbed in his book when the boy turned around; stuck a pin in another boy, presently, in order to hear him say “Ouch!” and got a new reprimand from his teacher.
— from The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain

As our very acts become more intellectual, our tendencies more rational, and our judgment, for example, as to what seems reasonable, is very different from what it was a hundred years ago: so the forms of our lives grow ever more intellectual and, to the old fashioned eye, perhaps, uglier, but only because it cannot see that the richness of inner, rational beauty always spreads and deepens, and that the inner, rational aspect of all things should now be of more consequence
— from Human, All Too Human: A Book for Free Spirits by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

But to make a piece of work about three thousand three hundred lashes, what every poor little charity-boy gets every month—it is enough to amaze, astonish, astound the compassionate bowels of all who hear it, nay, all who come to hear it in the course of time.
— from Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

I hated the abrupt self-confident tone of his voice, his admiration of his own witticisms, which were often frightfully stupid, though he was bold in his language; I hated his handsome, but stupid face (for which I would, however, have gladly exchanged my intelligent one), and the free-and-easy military manners in fashion in the "'forties."
— from Notes from the Underground by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Coupled with a direct stare from those peculiar greenish eyes, Muriel invariably felt a strong desire to laugh when in her presence.
— from Marjorie Dean, College Freshman by Josephine Chase

It is true that this distance made my guns even more ineffective, but I was decoying my Frenchman off from the land, and placing the Arrow between him and his port, so that his return would be intercepted.
— from The Privateer's-Man, One hundred Years Ago by Frederick Marryat

The forest, they knew, was full of warriors, some hunting, perhaps, but many thrown out on the great encircling movement intended to enclose the five.
— from The Eyes of the Woods: A Story of the Ancient Wilderness by Joseph A. (Joseph Alexander) Altsheler

Whereupon the general, even more incensed than she, entered his carriage, and, proceeding to Schoenbrunn, laid the wonderful production before the Emperor.
— from Recollections of the Private Life of Napoleon — Complete by Louis Constant Wairy

They wrangled with the cabbies about fares, paid out their good money—it was payday on the ships the day before they arrived—and growled as true sailormen should growl when they got English money in change for their own gold and American notes.
— from With the Battle Fleet Cruise of the Sixteen Battleships of the United States Atlantic Fleet from Hampton Roads to the Golden Gate, December, 1907-May, 1908 by Franklin Matthews

"IT IS A BEAUTEOUS EVENING, CALM AND FREE" GLOAMING EVENING MELODY "IN THE COOL OF THE EVENING" TWILIGHT TWILIGHT AT SEA
— from The Home Book of Verse — Volume 1 by Burton Egbert Stevenson

Thomas Luttrell, whose great Elizabethan memorial is in the south-east chapel, was the father of the man who rebuilt the castle and did so much for Dunster—George Luttrell, who kneels here in effigy; and the slab that now lies under the window of the south aisle once covered the grave of the Lady Elizabeth who, as a widow, bought the manor of Dunster from [205] the widow of Sir John de Mohun.
— from Motor Tours in the West Country by Stawell, Rodolph, Mrs.

He thought his mind a good enough machine, if it were given time to act, but it acted wrong if hurried.
— from The Education of Henry Adams by Henry Adams

But the tide was gaining every moment in strength, and partly drifting, partly rowing, the Dragon, like a bull attacked by a pack of dogs, made her way down the river.
— from The Dragon and the Raven; Or, The Days of King Alfred by G. A. (George Alfred) Henty

They abjured, with a foreign heresy, the manners and language of the Greeks: every Melchite, in their eyes, was a stranger, every Jacobite a citizen; the alliance of marriage, the offices of humanity, were condemned as a deadly sin the natives renounced all allegiance to the emperor; and his orders, at a distance from Alexandria, were obeyed only under the pressure of military force.
— from History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire — Volume 4 by Edward Gibbon