It is holy ground where the shadow falls!" "How prettily you express this sentiment!" said the artist.
— from The House of the Seven Gables by Nathaniel Hawthorne

It’s with the youngsters that you can work—those who are physically and physiologically young enough to derive benefit from agerone and education.
— from The Lani People by Jesse F. (Jesse Franklin) Bone

Good Master Wilson, I pray you, examine this Pearl,—since that is her name,—and see whether she hath had such Christian nurture as befits a child of her age.”
— from The Scarlet Letter by Nathaniel Hawthorne

But, perhaps you expect to get into heaven by crawling through the lubber’s hole, cook; but, no, no, cook, you don’t get there, except you go the regular way, round by the rigging.
— from Moby Dick; Or, The Whale by Herman Melville

A man does not belong to this race because he happens to be more gifted, more virtuous, more heroic, or more loving than the men below, but because he is colder, brighter, more far-sighted, and more lonely; because he endures, prefers, and even insists upon, loneliness as the joy, the privilege, yea, even the condition of existence; because he lives amid clouds and lightnings as among his equals, and likewise among sunrays, dewdrops, snowflakes, and all that which must needs come from the heights, and which in its course moves ever from heaven to earth.
— from The Will to Power: An Attempted Transvaluation of All Values. Book III and IV by Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

But with the coming of Peter, who hates lethargy, they are under way again: if you put your ear to the ground now, you would hear the whole island seething with life.
— from Peter Pan by J. M. (James Matthew) Barrie

Cuéntase además que por aquellos días el nuevo gobernador de la provincia celebró una conferencia con este importante personaje, oyendo de sus labios las mayores seguridades de contribuir al reposo público y evitar toda ocasión 20 de disturbios.
— from Doña Perfecta by Benito Pérez Galdós

But with the coming of Peter, who hates lethargy, they are all under way again: if you put your ear to the ground now, you would hear the whole island seething with life.
— from Peter and Wendy by J. M. (James Matthew) Barrie

If you put your ear to the ground you may hear the sound of men’s voices or horses’ feet in a plain or valley much further off than when you stand upright.
— from Emile by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Does Rosenthal pay you enough to keep this up, or is somebody else footing the bills?
— from Felix O'Day by Francis Hopkinson Smith

This it soon did to such a degree, that, in spite of all his efforts, he gradually sank lower and lower, until, unable longer to retain a footing, his legs were overhanging the awful gulf, and he was rapidly sliding off, when, by a desperate effort, he threw up his feet, so that they reached the opposite side of the shaft, whilst his body still remained on the projecting drift, against which he firmly planted his back, and with his feet on the opposite side, he was thus enabled to gain a stationary position; yet, even then, the soil continually crumbling away, rendered it doubtful how long he might be able to retain it.
— from Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 59, No. 364, February 1846 by Various

Place your ear to the ground, study the whims of the people, learn how they worship, how they play and how they work, then preach their doctrines, pat them on the back, applaud their errors, and you can be popular.
— from What's What in America by Eugene V. (Eugene Valentine) Brewster

“Item, to Mr. Peter Young, Elimosinar, twentie four gownis of blew clayth, to be gevin to xxiiij auld men, according to the yeiris of his hienes age, extending to viii xx viii elnis clayth; price of the elne xxiiij s. Inde, ij c j li.
— from The Antiquary — Complete by Walter Scott

“This festival insults us, and I must therefore pray your excellency to prohibit it.”
— from Louisa of Prussia and Her Times: A Historical Novel by L. (Luise) Mühlbach

you are always repeating to us that the nature of man is perverted; you exclaim, "that all flesh has corrupted its way , that all the propensities of nature have become inordinate."
— from Good Sense by Holbach, Paul Henri Thiry, baron d'

Then came a scuffling in the straw, a thud, that half-human sigh, and his voice again: 'Putt your 'ead to piller, that's my dandy gel.
— from Atlantic Narratives: Modern Short Stories by H. G. (Harrison Griswold) Dwight

This is the fruit which, I perceive, you expect to find growing upon the vines which you have planted and watered; and, by the help of my Master, this shall be the labor of my life.
— from The American Missionary — Volume 32, No. 11, November, 1878 by Various

Lieut.-Governor and Commander-in-Chief in and over His Majesty's Province of Nova Scotia, and its Dependencies, &c. &c. &c. "May it please your Excellency, "The magistrates and militia officers of King's County, humbly intreat, that they may be allowed to offer their assurance of high respect and unfeigned esteem to your Excellency, on your departure from Nova Scotia.
— from Some Account of the Public Life of the Late Lieutenant-General Sir George Prevost, Bart. Particularly of His Services in the Canadas, Including a Reply to the Strictures on His Military Character, Contained in an Article in the Quarterly Review by E. B. Brenton