Without this area was a wide margin of neutral grounds, separating them from their nearest frontegers if they spoke a different language, and claimed by neither; but less wide, and less clearly marked, when they spoke dialects of the same language.
— from Ancient Society Or, Researches in the Lines of Human Progress from Savagery, through Barbarism to Civilization by Lewis Henry Morgan

Great is the contrast between the Songs of Burns and the Rime of the Italian poet, between the fine spiritual perception of Carlyle’s mind and the delicate touch of Titian’s hand, between picturesque expression and an expressive picture; yet this very antithesis seemed to prepare my mind for the full enjoyment of both these famous portraits; the sombre majesty of northern genius seemed to heighten and be heightened by the sunset glow of the genius of the south.
— from Life of Robert Burns by Thomas Carlyle

“It is apparently too often a congenial task,” says George Eliot in her Essay on Heine , “to write severe words about the transgressions of men of genius; especially when the censor has the advantage of being himself a man of no genius, so that those 6 transgressions seem to him quite gratuitous; he, forsooth, never lacerated anyone by his wit or gave irresistible piquancy to a coarse allusion; and his indignation is not mitigated by any knowledge of the temptation that lies in transcendent power.”
— from In Good Company Some personal recollections of Swinburne, Lord Roberts, Watts-Dunton, Oscar Wilde Edward Whymper, S. J. Stone, Stephen Phillips by Coulson Kernahan

All was confusion indeed, in the ranks of Richard; but Norfolk and many other noble gentlemen struggled to the last, and died without yielding an inch of ground.
— from The Woodman: A Romance of the Times of Richard III by G. P. R. (George Payne Rainsford) James

The index comprises, besides miscellaneous items, four large classes of matter: (1) topics, including many minor ones not given separate textual captions; (2) all individual words and members of pairs explained or commented on in the text; (3) the key syllables, but not the separate words, of family groups; (4) the first or generic term, but not the other terms, in all assemblies of synonyms; hence, this book can be used as a handbook of ordinarily used synonyms.
— from The Century Vocabulary Builder by Joseph M. (Joseph Morris) Bachelor

A simple, unintelligent man, of no great shrewdness, though free of any maudlin sentiment, he stood fast in the mid-street and saluted the flag, not because he was obliged to do so, but because he passionately craved to do so.
— from The Sagebrusher: A Story of the West by Emerson Hough