In what manner civil societies proceeded in providing for the making of laws and for the enforcing of them; the various ways in which they took measures to protect the weak against the strong; how they have gone to work to secure wealth against the attacks of poverty; these are subjects that it would require volumes to detail; but these truths are written on the heart of man: that all men are, by nature, equal ; that civil society can never have arisen from any motive other than that of the benefit of the whole ; that, whenever civil society makes the greater part of the people worse off than they were under the Law of Nature, the civil compact is, in conscience, dissolved, and all the rights of nature return; that, in civil society, the rights and the duties go hand in hand , and that, when the former are taken away, the latter cease to exist.
— from Advice to Young Men And (Incidentally) to Young Women in the Middle and Higher Ranks of Life. In a Series of Letters, Addressed to a Youth, a Bachelor, a Lover, a Husband, a Father, a Citizen, or a Subject. by William Cobbett

She would like to have finished her speech thus: "that you had not engrossed the children so completely;" but she said instead, with a little smile meant to look conscious, "I believe I meant, dear, that I should have been very glad to talk to the children myself."
— from Fated to Be Free: A Novel by Jean Ingelow

He therefore left the partisan to descend the stairs, followed by Pompée, who carried the valise with an air of studied indifference, so that no one might suspect the nature of its contents; having waited a few moments, he cast his eye around the room to make sure that he had forgotten nothing, extinguished the candles, stole cautiously down to the ground-floor, venturing a timid glance through the half-open door of a brilliantly [Pg 82] lighted room on that floor, and, wrapping himself closely in a heavy cloak, which Pompée handed him, placed his foot in the squire's hand, leaped lightly into the saddle, scolded the old soldier good-naturedly for his moderation, and disappeared in the darkness.
— from The War of Women, Volume 1 by Alexandre Dumas

“Now, Ethelred, the coals,” she called.
— from A Maid at King Alfred's Court: A Story for Girls by Lucy Foster Madison

They are "Historic Notes of Life and Letters in New England;" "The Chardon Street Convention;" "Ezra Ripley, D.D.;" "Mary Moody Emerson;" "Samuel Hoar;" "Thoreau;" "Carlyle."— Mr. Cabot prefaces the eleventh and last volume of Emerson's writings with the following "Note":— "The first five pieces in this volume, and the 'Editorial Address' from the 'Massachusetts Quarterly Review,' were published by Mr. Emerson long ago.
— from Complete Project Gutenberg Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr. Works by Oliver Wendell Holmes

It is doubtful if any other social institution in rural communities, not excepting the church, so completely interests the entire family.
— from Chapters in Rural Progress by Kenyon L. (Kenyon Leech) Butterfield

XIX It is not easy to characterise so complex a personality as Bruno undoubtedly was.
— from Giordano Bruno by J. Lewis (James Lewis) McIntyre