When good taste has in this way purified and digested some turgid medley, it still has a progress to make.
— from The Life of Reason: The Phases of Human Progress by George Santayana

τὸ μέγεθος τῆς ἡγεμονίας ἐνδείξασθαι; (When I reflect on this, my beloved Emperor, and behold you displaying in all that you do the result of your study of Homer, and see you so eager to benefit every citizen in the community in every way, and devising for me individually such honours and privileges one after another, then I think that you desire to be nobler than the king of the Greeks, to such a degree, that, whereas he insulted his bravest men, you, I believe, grant forgiveness to many even of the undeserving, since you approve the maxim of Pittacus which set mercy before vengeance.
— from The Works of the Emperor Julian, Vol. 1 by Emperor of Rome Julian

No man, I said, has any proprium as the word is commonly understood.
— from Angelic Wisdom about Divine Providence by Emanuel Swedenborg

Several times he spoke to me of my family, and of my sister, who was a nun before the Revolution, and who had been compelled to leave her convent; and one day asked me if she had a pension, and how much it was.
— from Complete Project Gutenberg Collection of Memoirs of Napoleon by Various

'I then asked her to tell me if she had any particular liking for me.
— from Boswell the Biographer by George Mallory

I found in the haversack crackers and ground coffee mixed with sugar; and bringing into requisition my matches, tin cup, and canteen of water (which three things I was always careful to have about me), I soon had a pint of steaming beverage.
— from Reminiscences of a Rebel by Wayland Fuller Dunaway

I giue my liuing Lord thankes for placing me in such honour and plentifulnesse of all things.
— from The Principal Navigations, Voyages, Traffiques, and Discoveries of the English Nation — Volume 14 America, Part III by Richard Hakluyt

“I am mounting it,” said he, and proceeded to do as he said.
— from Mistress Wilding by Rafael Sabatini

The wheels sank into the sand and made it so hard a pull for the oxen that we had [Pg 53] to double up teams, taking one wagon through and going back for another, so we only made about three miles that day.
— from A Gold Hunter's Experience by Chalkley J. Hambleton