I remember buying in the street many years ago a little mechanical puzzle that had a tremendous sale at the time.
— from Amusements in Mathematics by Henry Ernest Dudeney

The inhabitants consented to ransom their lives and property by the payment of a large sum of money, and the invaders retreated back into their deserts, animated, rather than satisfied, with the first success of their arms against an opulent but feeble country.
— 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

You then that have the care of little Children, do not much trouble their thoughts and clog their memories with bare Grammar Rudiments, which to them are harsh in getting, and fluid in retaining; because indeed to them they signifie nothing, but a mere swimming notion of a general term, which they know not what it meaneth, till they comprehend particulars, but by this or the like subsidiary, inform them, first with some knowledge of things and words wherewith to express them, and then their Rules of speaking will be better understood and more firmly kept in mind.
— from The Orbis Pictus by Johann Amos Comenius

The virtues are based on justice, of which common honesty in buying and selling is the shadow, and justice is based on the idea of good, which is the harmony of the world, and is reflected both in the institutions of states and in motions of the heavenly bodies (cp.
— from The Republic of Plato by Plato

The sun had now completely risen, and the whole facade of Granite House became illuminated by its rays; but in the interior as well as on the exterior all was quiet and calm.
— from The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne

The real fruit of their battles lies, not in the immediate result, but in the ever-expanding union of the workers.
— from The Communist Manifesto by Friedrich Engels

And a narrative it remains both in the speeches which the poet recites from time to time and in the intermediate passages? Quite true.
— from The Republic by Plato

If the crows eat it, he is received back into the caste.
— from Omens and Superstitions of Southern India by Edgar Thurston

She stood with her left hand towards the descending sun, and leafy boughs screened her from its rays; but in this sober light the delicate colouring of her face seemed to gather a calm vividness, like flowers at evening.
— from Adam Bede by George Eliot

If the crows eat this, he is received back into the caste.
— from Castes and Tribes of Southern India. Vol. 7 of 7 by Edgar Thurston

Up and up, until of a sudden the sheer Fall dropped its relentless barrier in the path of the fugitive.
— from Bob, Son of Battle by Alfred Ollivant

On the 1st of June the Saskatchewan, swelled by the melting of the snow near the Rocky Mountains, rose twelve feet and the current of the little rivers bounding Pine Island ran back into the lake, which it filled with mud.
— from The Journey to the Polar Sea by John Franklin

"And then, if you get one, you'll get a tender hearted streak and put it right back in the water," grumbled Harry.
— from The Grammar School Boys Snowbound; or, Dick & Co. at Winter Sports by H. Irving (Harrie Irving) Hancock

I had paid Noble £2 for it, thinking it must be worth £3; but before I reached Bloomsbury, I thought that it might not be too dear at £7, 7s.
— from The Confessions of a Collector by William Carew Hazlitt

His pace is rapid, but I think we are getting up with it, at last.
— from Guy Garrick by Arthur B. (Arthur Benjamin) Reeve

And in the second year it reached Byzantium in the middle of spring, where it happened that I was staying at that time.
— from History of the Wars, Books I and II The Persian War by Procopius

When a soldier, fighting for plunder and empty glory, dies, he merits little sympathy; but when in a good cause, and in a battle that cannot be avoided, he draws his sword, falling on the field not for idle renown but in the defence of the weak and oppressed, and for the preservation of his country, then the words of the poet appear more suitable to him— “There is a tear for all that die, A mourner o’er the humblest grave; But nations swell the funeral cry, And triumph sweeps above the brave.
— from Soldiers and Sailors or, Anecdotes, Details, and Recollections of Naval and Military Life, as Related to His Nephews, by an Old Officer. by Old Humphrey

Many complicated changes have occurred in the constitution of these eggs and sperms before this stage is reached, but into these we need not enter.
— from Embryology: The Beginnings of Life by Gerald R. (Gerald Rowley) Leighton

Could it really be in the house?
— from Billie Bradley and Her Inheritance; Or, The Queer Homestead at Cherry Corners by Janet D. Wheeler

As for Dick Benyon, it was impossible to speak to him without perceiving that if remorse be in truth the sharpest penalty of sin, he was already punished enough.
— from Quisanté by Anthony Hope