Paris may be stupid, if it sees fit; it sometimes allows itself this luxury; then the universe is stupid in company with it; then Paris awakes, rubs its eyes, says: “How stupid I am!”
— from Les Misérables by Victor Hugo

As a matter of fact, hardly one of the multifarious princes and rulers in Europe seems to have been acting in good faith.
— from The Outline of History: Being a Plain History of Life and Mankind by H. G. (Herbert George) Wells

He was prepared with the most elegant pipes and robes I ever saw, and shortly declared, "That white blood had never been shed in the village of the Yanctongs, even when rum was permitted; that Mr. Murdoch Cameron arrived at his village last autumn; that he invited him to eat, gave him corn as a bird; that Cameron informed him of the prohibition of rum, and was the only person who afterward sold it in the village."
— from The Expeditions of Zebulon Montgomery Pike, Volume 1 (of 3) To Headwaters of the Mississippi River Through Louisiana Territory, and in New Spain, During the Years 1805-6-7. by Zebulon Montgomery Pike

Given, a man with moderate intellect, a moral standard not higher than the average, some rhetorical affluence and great glibness of speech, what is the career in which, without the aid of birth or money, he may most easily attain power and reputation in English society?
— from Elementary Guide to Literary Criticism by F. V. N. (Franklin Verzelius Newton) Painter

“The marble work, which forms the most distinguishing characteristic of this palatial abode, receives its entire shape and finish in the basement and first floor of the building.
— from Lights and Shadows of New York Life or, the Sights and Sensations of the Great City by James Dabney McCabe

Nevertheless, politics plays a rôle in every state of the Union, the complexity and strenuousness of which are not known in any other country in the world, and wherever the political game is pursued with resoluteness and vigour, we may depend upon it that all factions possess what Americans themselves very aptly describe as "inside information" regarding what is taking place in other opposing camps; all the more so, indeed, as success in political campaigns in America means possession and employment of a kind of patronage which is invariably expressed in terms of dollars and cents.
— from Spies and Secret Service The story of espionage, its main systems and chief exponents by Hamil Grant

p. 21) he says of wages, profit, and rent, ‘in every society, the price of every commodity finally resolves itself into some one or other, or all of those three parts; and in every improved society, all the three enter, more or less, as component parts, into the price of the far greater part of commodities .’
— from History of Civilization in England, Vol. 3 of 3 by Henry Thomas Buckle

In the park, and on a bench having the seclusion of a corner, he drew the report from his pocket and read it eagerly, several times.
— from The Walking Delegate by Leroy Scott

Between him and Nellie letters had secretly passed, at regular intervals, ever since the Christmas vacation.
— from Campaigning with Crook, and Stories of Army Life by Charles King