[3337] King James, 1605, when he came to see our University of Oxford, and amongst other edifices now went to view that famous library, renewed by Sir Thomas Bodley, in imitation of Alexander, at his departure brake out into that noble speech, If I were not a king, I would be a university man:
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

In this ending the Black King must not only be driven to the edge of the board, but he must also be forced into a corner, and, before a mate can be given, the White King must be brought to the sixth rank and, at the same time, in one of the last two files; in this case either K R 6, K Kt 6, K B 7, K B 8, and as K R 6 and K Kt 6 are the nearest squares, it is to either of these squares that the King ought to go.
— from Chess Fundamentals by José Raúl Capablanca

Difficile est satiram non scribere —It is difficult not to indulge in ( lit.
— from Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern, English and Foreign Sources Including Phrases, Mottoes, Maxims, Proverbs, Definitions, Aphorisms, and Sayings of Wise Men, in Their Bearing on Life, Literature, Speculation, Science, Art, Religion, and Morals, Especially in the Modern Aspects of Them by Wood, James, Rev.

"I'm not sure if I DO understand," she said.
— from The Age of Innocence by Edith Wharton

I have never seen it in blume.
— from The Journals of Lewis and Clark, 1804-1806 by William Clark

He gave me no salutation; indeed it was no time for civilities; only “Come!” says he, and set off running along the side of the mountain towards Balachulish; and I, like a sheep, to follow him.
— from Kidnapped by Robert Louis Stevenson

The devil goes on exacting compound interest to the last for his early share and numerous succeeding investments in them.
— from Walden, and On The Duty Of Civil Disobedience by Henry David Thoreau

There are no secrets in it.
— from Project Gutenberg Compilation of 233 Short Stories of Chekhov by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

Dey ain’ no sense in it.”
— from Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain

Emerson was too serene ever to be discourteous, and was capable of the hottest antagonism without rudeness, and the most intense indignation without quickening his speech or raising his tone; grasping and exhausting with imaginative activity whatever object furnished him with matter for thought, and throwing to the rubbish heap whatever was superficial; indifferent to form or polish if only he could find a diamond; reveling in mystery, and with eyes that penetrated like the X-ray through all obscurities, and found at the bottom of them what there was to find; arrested by no surfaces, inflexible in his devotion to truth, and indifferent to all personalities or artificial conditions of men or things.
— from The Autobiography of a Journalist, Volume I by William James Stillman

The art of forming tubes of uniform diameter is nearly similar in its mode of execution to wire drawing.
— from On the Economy of Machinery and Manufactures by Charles Babbage

The colour should be rather darker than that of the feathers, fur, wool, or whatever else has been taken to form the casting; and if it is not so, it is a sign that the crop is foul.
— from The Art and Practice of Hawking by E. B. (Edward Blair) Michell

When the Indians are out, Major, it is like having a needle in a carpet: you may tread on it first step, and you may not strike it in ten years.
— from Saddle and Mocassin by Francis Francis

And he says that that distressing item of Mr. Bloke's is nothing but a lot of distressing bash, and has no point to it, and no sense in it, and no information in it, and that there was no sort of necessity for stopping the press to publish it.
— from Sketches New and Old, Part 4. by Mark Twain

There was in this no special injustice inflicted on him—it was merely the regular inquisitorial routine.
— from A History of the Inquisition of Spain; vol. 2 by Henry Charles Lea

After this mixture is filled with the vine (badly named spawn) it is pressed into blocks and dried.
— from Toadstools, mushrooms, fungi, edible and poisonous; one thousand American fungi How to select and cook the edible; how to distinguish and avoid the poisonous, with full botanic descriptions. Toadstool poisons and their treatment, instructions to students, recipes for cooking, etc., etc. by Charles McIlvaine

What is that which has a mouth but never speaks, and a bed but never sleeps in it?
— from The Handbook of Conundrums by Edith B. (Edith Bertha) Ordway

If I am never permitted to revisit my native soil, if I die in a foreign land, know, that, faithful to you to my latest hour, my last thought, prayer, and sigh, will be yours."
— from Love After Marriage; and Other Stories of the Heart by Caroline Lee Hentz

It has no speculation in its eyes.
— from The Theory of the Theatre, and Other Principles of Dramatic Criticism by Clayton Meeker Hamilton