What does all this mean?” said the old Judge, eagerly; for the idea of any one presuming to be ill without duly apprising him—without the preliminary step of ascertaining that it could not inconvenience him—was more than he was fully prepared for.
— from Sir Brook Fossbrooke, Volume I. by Charles James Lever

That figure with the helmet and spear is St. George, the patron saint of England, and the patron saint of all that is chivalrous in Christianity.
— from Holidays & Happy-Days by Hamish Hendry

Of course, it is understood that the promise bears on something advantageous to him to whom we make it; for if I promise some one a thrashing, it cannot be maintained that I am obliged to give it to him; and if he to whom I make the promise will not receive what I offer, I am by that very fact relieved from my promise; for one cannot give anything to another against his will; I am under no obligation to him who will not receive anything from me.
— from Elements of Morals With Special Application of the Moral Law to the Duties of the Individual and of Society and the State by Paul Janet

The architecture of Egypt, of which the principal forms are pyramids, sphinxes, obelisks, and temples, is characterized by massiveness of material, grandeur of proportion, and simplicity of parts—a style well suited to its flat, sandy soil, though it would look heavy and out of place in a country where nature had herself supplied the elements of grandeur and massiveness in the form of lofty mountains or mighty forests.
— from Scientific American Supplement, No. 598, June 18, 1887 by Various