I realised vaguely that I was on the wrong path; I longed for peace and quiet, and hoped to find these most effectually by getting married, and so putting an end to the state of things that had become the source of so much anxiety to me.
— from My Life — Volume 1 by Richard Wagner

The two are called “one person in law,” for the purpose of inferring that whatever is hers is his, but the parallel inference is never drawn that whatever is his is hers; the maxim is not applied against the man, except to make him responsible to third parties for her acts, as a master is for the acts of his slaves or of his cattle.
— from The Subjection of Women by John Stuart Mill

precipitancy, precipitation; impetuosity; levity; foolhardihood[obs3], foolhardiness; heedlessness, thoughtlessness &c. (inattention) 458; carelessness &c. (neglect) 460; desperation; Quixotism, knight-errantry; fire eating.
— from Roget's Thesaurus by Peter Mark Roget

Go to transcription of text TITLE PAGE, LYONS, 1541 This edition, printed in Lyons, France, in 1541, by Sebastian Gryphius is said to have been pirated from the Torinus edition given at Basel in the same year.
— from Cookery and Dining in Imperial Rome by Apicius

So gently raising her right leg and creeping as close behind her as I could, I placed my right leg between her thighs in such a manner that my champion shoved himself between her legs, stretching up almost to her navel, In this position I lay for some little time till some half muttered words and certain movements of her body made me suspect that Laura in her sleep was acting over again the scenes of the previous night.
— from Laura Middleton; Her Brother and her Lover by Anonymous

If it is true that a hindrance or withholding of normal sexual satisfaction will bring out perverse tendencies in persons who have not previously shown them, we must assume that these persons must have harbored tendencies akin to perversities—or, if you will, perversities in latent form.
— from A General Introduction to Psychoanalysis by Sigmund Freud

I was more inclined to quiet, so to say idyllic pleasures; I liked fishing, evening walks, gathering mushrooms; Lubkov preferred picnics, fireworks, hunting.
— from Project Gutenberg Compilation of 233 Short Stories of Chekhov by Anton Pavlovich Chekhov

An arrangement so well calculated to foster selfishness and arrogance, so long established, produced its legitimate fruit.
— from Woman: Man's Equal by Thomas Webster

The flowers are variable in color, and produced in loose clusters; the seeds are produced in long, flattened, or cylindrical, bivalved pods, and vary, in a remarkable degree, in their size, form, and color,—their germinative powers are retained three or four years.
— from The Field and Garden Vegetables of America Containing Full Descriptions of Nearly Eleven Hundred Species and Varietes; With Directions for Propagation, Culture and Use. by Fearing Burr

Then it is freed from the fibres, pressed in large frames, and dried at the fire or in the sun.
— from The Story of Ida Pfeiffer and Her Travels in Many Lands by Anonymous

I seen Potter James and old Pete Whitehead over to Andrewville yesterday, and they'll fetch their people in line for you all right.
— from The Statesmen Snowbound by Robert Fitzgerald

In childhood it’s dollies, it’s novels for girls, But tell me my friends if you can, Where’s the pleasure in life for a girl of eighteen Like the pleasure of catching a man?
— from Santa Claus' Daughter: A Musical Christmas Burlesque in Two Acts by F. W. Hardcastle

Fifth Order This is going to be your chief business and pursuit in life for the next few months, this reducing of your weight.
— from Diet and Health; With Key to the Calories by Lulu Hunt Peters

Catholic Clergy, Endowment question, ii. 199 Cavaignac, General, iii. 199 , 205 Cécille, Admiral, Ambassador to the Court of St. James's, iii. 268 Ceylon, committee of enquiry into administration of, iii. 269 ; witnesses, 308 ; evidence of Captain Watson, 312 Chantrey, death of, ii. 60; monument by, in Lichfield Cathedral, 60 Charles Albert, King of Sardinia, defeat of, iii. 218 ; abdication of, 282 Chartists, progress of the, i. 155; precautions in London for great meeting of the (1848), iii. 160 , 162 , 164 ; failure of the demonstration, 165 ; dangerous manifestations in the country, 188 ; Government measures, 190 ; agitation, 191 ; demonstration, 192 ; establishment near Chenies, 215 Chatham, Rt. Hon.
— from The Greville Memoirs, Part 2 (of 3), Volume 3 (of 3) A Journal of the Reign of Queen Victoria from 1837 to 1852 by Charles Greville

You furnish patent, incandescent lights for premises where the torch of Hymen has burned so low you can't light a cigar at it.
— from Whirligigs by O. Henry