She always received me very kindly, and, treating me as a young man, she took pleasure in giving me, every time I called on her, very agreeable lessons in morals.
— from The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt, 1725-1798. Complete by Giacomo Casanova

You could not light upon a sweeter thing: A body slight and round and like a pear In growing, modest eyes, a hand a foot Lessening in perfect cadence, and a skin As clean and white as privet when it flowers.
— from The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson by Tennyson, Alfred Tennyson, Baron

It is true that many homosexuals, both men and women, portray in general mental efficiency that peculiar want of proportion in some direction which is the inevitable symptom of mental abnormality; the male may be obviously effeminate, or, male or female, eccentric or hysterical.
— from An Outline of Sexual Morality by Kenneth Ingram

To think I loved so lightly, to think I would attend that fatal hour; no, Philander , no faithless, dear enchanter: last night, the eve to my intended wedding-day, having reposed my soul by my resolves for flight, and only waiting the lucky minute for escape, I set a willing hand to every thing that was preparing for the ceremony of the ensuing morning; with that pretence I got me early to my chamber, tried on a thousand dresses, and asked a thousand questions, all impertinent, which would do best, which looked most gay and rich, then dressed my gown with jewels, decked my apartment up, and left nothing undone that might secure 'em both of my being pleased, and of my stay; nay, and to give the less suspicion, I undressed myself even to my under-petticoat and night-gown; I would not take a jewel, not a pistole, but left my women finishing my work, and carelessly and thus undressed, walked towards the garden, and while every one was busy in their office, getting myself out of sight, posted over the meadow to the wood as swift as Daphne from the god of day, till I arrived most luckily where I found the chariot waiting; attended by Brilliard ; of whom, when I (all fainting and breathless with my swift flight) demanded his lord, he lifted me into the chariot, and cried, 'a little farther, Madam , you will find him; for he, for fear of making a discovery, took yonder shaded path'--towards which we went, but no dear vision of my love appeared--And thus, my charming lover, you have my kind adventure; send me some tidings back that you are found, that you are well, and lastly that you are mine, or this, that should have been my wedding-day, will see itself that of the death of SYLVIA.
— from Love-Letters Between a Nobleman and His Sister by Aphra Behn

But there is majestic poetry in great machines, even in railway engines.
— from Philip Hale's Boston Symphony Programme Notes by Philip Hale

People in general moreover expected from the nephew of Marius, the son-in-law of Cinna, the ally of Catilina, a repetition of the Marian and Cinnan horrors, a realization of the saturnalia of anarchy projected by Catilina; and though Caesar certainly gained allies through this expectation— so that the political refugees immediately put themselves in a body at his disposal, the ruined men saw in him their deliverer, and the lowest ranks of the rabble in the capital and country towns were thrown into a ferment on the news of his advance,—these belonged to the class of friends who are more dangerous than foes.
— from The History of Rome (Volumes 1-5) by Theodor Mommsen

Mr. Pleydell, in Guy Mannering , ed. 1860, iv. 96, says: 'You'll excuse my old-fashioned importunity.
— from Life of Johnson, Volume 4 1780-1784 by James Boswell

"That is, your poetry is getting more elaborate."
— from The Outdoor Girls in a Motor Car; Or, The Haunted Mansion of Shadow Valley by Laura Lee Hope

Mrs. Pooley indubitably gone, Mrs. Eliott wandered down to Johnson in his study.
— from The Helpmate by May Sinclair

But she thought of her friend’s words and ways, and opinions, and seeing her superiority to people in general, Miss Elizabeth became to her the ideal of all womanly sweetness and excellence.
— from David Fleming's Forgiveness by Margaret M. (Margaret Murray) Robertson

Certain facts which serve to explain The physical charms of Miss Addie De Laine, Who, as the common reports obtain, Surpassed in complexion the lily and rose; With a very sweet mouth and a retrousse nose; A figure like Hebe's, or that which revolves In a milliner's window, and partially solves That question which mentor and moralist pains, If grace may exist minus feeling or brains.
— from Complete Poetical Works by Bret Harte

No, man, I just think there's no point in giving monetary encouragement to all these other assholes."
— from Project Cyclops by Thomas Hoover