This manner of acting roused much respect for d’Artagnan’s policy among the Musketeers.
— from The Three Musketeers by Alexandre Dumas

The experienced merit of a reigning monarch is acknowledged by his subjects with reluctance, and frequently denied with partial and discontented murmurs; while, from the opening virtues of his successor, they fondly conceive the most unbounded hopes of private as well as public 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

And as for those foreshortenings that he made, although, as I have said, he showed a faulty manner in them by reason of the difficulty of making them, none the less he who is the pioneer in the difficulties of any exercise deserves a much greater name than those who follow with a somewhat more ordered and regular manner.
— from Lives of the Most Eminent Painters Sculptors and Architects, Vol. 01 (of 10) Cimabue to Agnolo Gaddi by Giorgio Vasari

It is true, hadst thou entered their abode, thou mightst not have found thy foolish ideal of an heroic, extravagant virtue, which is only the fanciful creation of your vices and your pride; but thou wouldst have seen the man of a retiring modesty and noble resignation, who in his obscurity excels in virtue and true grandeur of soul your boasted heroes of field and cabinet.
— from Demonology and Devil-lore by Moncure Daniel Conway

‘Mamma has left off her widow’s cap in honour of uncle’s marriage,’ observed Arthur, reading my looks with a child’s mingled simplicity and quickness of observation.
— from The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Brontë

I do mean to say, however, that the whole facts, taken together, will be sufficient to justify you, in the minds of all reasonable men.
— from The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens

In its language citizens of every nation may converse; at its altar men of all religions may kneel; to its creed disciples of every faith may subscribe.
— from The Symbolism of Freemasonry Illustrating and Explaining Its Science and Philosophy, Its Legends, Myths and Symbols by Albert Gallatin Mackey

Here we staid a good while, and then I to my office, and read my vows seriously and with content, and so home to supper, to prayers, and to bed.
— from The Diary of Samuel Pepys — Complete by Samuel Pepys

The direction of operations, besides, which must be varied with every change of the weather, as well as with many other accidents, requires much more judgment and discretion, than that of those which are always the same, or very nearly the same.
— from An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith

[Meng Shih comes nearer to the mark in his note: "When slowly marching, order and ranks must be preserved"—so as to guard against surprise attacks.
— from The Art of War by active 6th century B.C. Sunzi

Hence, though our Lord was the model of a religious man, he was no enthusiast, still less a fanatic.
— from Joy in Service; Forgetting, and Pressing Onward; Until the Day Dawn by George Tybout Purves

Now beneath the crescent moon No spirits stir, no wind makes mirth, Only a rhythmic monotone Of waters dropping in a well….
— from The Five Books of Youth by Robert Hillyer

The sample is obtained by cutting out the head of the drum and removing a vertical section by means of a special sampling tube or a piece of half-inch iron pipe which is forced to the bottom of the drum with a boring motion and then removed; the core is then forced out by means of a rod, mixed, and quartered down to the required size.
— from Chlorination of Water by Joseph Race

And when I finally hit a town that contained some regular doctors I'd let them paw me over and rehabbit me and overhaul my bearings and put me in such nice running order I'd be firing on all twelve cylinders at once.
— from Webster—Man's Man by Peter B. (Peter Bernard) Kyne

The great gentlemen and ladies of a place are its real lords and masters and mistresses; they are the quality, whether in a monarchy or a republic; mayors and governors and generals and senators and ex-presidents are nothing to them.
— from Complete Project Gutenberg Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. Works by Oliver Wendell Holmes

Bonaparte's animosity was, I confess, very natural, for he could not disguise from himself the real meaning of a resignation made under such circumstances.
— from Memoirs of Napoleon Bonaparte — Volume 07 by Louis Antoine Fauvelet de Bourrienne

Beyond it to the northwest and north the waste of sand stretched out to the horizon, 197 while southwest and south long ranges of serrated mountains ran hither and thither across the vast expanse, as if they had been moulded on a relief map, so sharp and so near did they seem to lie, though fifty miles away.
— from South America: Observations and Impressions New edition corrected and revised by Bryce, James Bryce, Viscount

“On my word, monsieur, I thought you were joking yesterday when you named such an hour for an interview,” said the old man, with the forced mirth of a ruined man, who does his best to smile.
— from Colonel Chabert by Honoré de Balzac

Sartor is more of a representative man than Wordsworth, for many have had part at least of his sad experiences, whereas Wordsworth's soul dwells apart: his joys and sorrows, his virtues and his sins, are alike his own, and he can circulate his being as soon as them.
— from Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Vol. 2, No. 8, January, 1851 by Various

"My own affairs require me.
— from The Purchase Price; Or, The Cause of Compromise by Emerson Hough