Abelard and Heloise write their letters—letters with a wonderful outpouring of soul—in medieval Latin; and Abelard, though he composes songs in the vulgar tongue, writes also in Latin those treatises in which he tries to find a ground of reality below the abstractions of philosophy, as one bent on trying all things by their congruity with human experience, who had felt the hand of Heloise, and looked into her eyes, and tested the resources of humanity in her great and energetic nature.
— from The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry by Walter Pater

Kutúzov alone would not see this and openly expressed his opinion that no fresh war could improve the position or add to the glory of Russia, but could only spoil and lower the glorious position that Russia had gained.
— from War and Peace by Tolstoy, Leo, graf

It always interested her to catch glimpses of rooms before the shutters were closed.
— from A Little Princess Being the whole story of Sara Crewe now told for the first time by Frances Hodgson Burnett

relief,—but I am the husband of Madame Lalande—of Madame Stephanie Lalande—with whom my good old relative, besides making me her sole heir when she dies—if she ever does—has been at the trouble of concocting me a match.
— from The Works of Edgar Allan Poe, The Raven Edition Table Of Contents And Index Of The Five Volumes by Edgar Allan Poe

Next morning early she went through the French Pass—a narrow gateway of rock, between bold headlands—so narrow, in fact, that it seemed no wider than a street.
— from Following the Equator: A Journey Around the World by Mark Twain

Seventy-two Houris , or black-eyed girls, of resplendent beauty, blooming youth, virgin purity, and exquisite sensibility, will be created for the use of the meanest believer; a moment of pleasure will be prolonged to a thousand years; and his faculties will be increased a hundred fold, to render him worthy of his felicity.
— 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

In a restaurant, when a lady bows to him, a gentleman merely makes the gesture of rising by getting up half way from his chair and at the same time bowing.
— from Etiquette by Emily Post

He is entitled by custom to certain small fees; thus, after a good harvest he is allowed, in some villages, five gantangs of padi, one gantang of rice ( bĕras ), and two chupaks of ĕmping (a preparation of rice and cocoa-nut made into a sort of sweetmeat) from each householder.
— from Malay Magic Being an introduction to the folklore and popular religion of the Malay Peninsula by Walter William Skeat

Any balance may either be returned by the liquidating Power direct to Germany, or retained by them.
— from The Economic Consequences of the Peace by John Maynard Keynes

Straightway spoke she thus to Turnus' sister, goddess to goddess, lady of pools and noisy rivers: such worship did Jupiter the high king of air consecrate to her for her stolen virginity: 'Nymph, grace of rivers, best beloved of our soul, thou knowest how out of all the Latin women that ever rose to high-hearted Jove's thankless bed, thee only have I preferred and gladly given part and place in heaven.
— from The Aeneid of Virgil by Virgil

Whispering Pine or the Graduates of Radcliffe By Rev. Elijah Kellogg 45.
— from Freaks of Fortune; or, Half Round the World by Oliver Optic

Thus she spake, and the steadfast goodly Odysseus rejoiced because she drew from them gifts, and beguiled their souls with soothing words, while her heart was set on other things.
— from The Odyssey of Homer, Done into English Prose by Homer

Who would not warm to the brightness and delicacy of those delicious rippling tones, that seemed to leap from the strings alive like sparks of fire—the dainty, tripping ease of the arpeggi, that float from the bow with the grace of rainbow bubbles blown forth upon the air,—the brilliant runs, that glide and glitter up and down like chattering brooks sparkling among violets and meadow-sweet,—the lovely softer notes, that here and there sigh between the varied harmonies with the dreamy passion of lovers who part, only to meet again in a rush of eager joy!—Alwyn sat absorbed and spellbound; he forgot the passing of time,—he forgot even the presence of Heliobas,—he could only listen, and gratefully drink in every drop of sweetness that was so lavishly poured upon him from such a glorious sky of sunlit sound.
— from Ardath: The Story of a Dead Self by Marie Corelli

Black looked the heaving sea, except where rings of white foam encircled each group of rocks, blacker still.
— from An Unsentimental Journey through Cornwall by Dinah Maria Mulock Craik

Was it fancy, or did the black eyes flash a gleam of hate—a glitter of rage beneath their long up-curving lashes?
— from The Gold Girl by James B. (James Beardsley) Hendryx

I thought I appreciated the monstrous growths of rumor before, but I never did.
— from Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, Volume II by Margaret Fuller

‘Irving’s Life’ ought to have a niche in every gallery of religious biography.
— from Eighteenth Century Waifs by John Ashton

Even in England, where the captive navies of the anti-Christ now sulked at anchor under England’s consecrated guns, some talked glibly of rule by Soviet.
— from The Crimson Tide: A Novel by Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers

I see before me a possibility perfectly magic in its charm and glorious colouring—it seems to me to scintillate with all the quivering grandeur of refined beauty, that there is an art at work within it which is so divine, so infernally divine, that one might seek through millenniums in vain for another such possibility; I see a spectacle so rich in meaning and so wonderfully paradoxical to boot, that it would be enough to make all the gods of Olympus rock with immortal laughter,— Cæsar Borgia as Pope.
— from The Twilight of the Idols; or, How to Philosophize with the Hammer. The Antichrist Complete Works, Volume Sixteen by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche