Happiness and sunshine, birds and trees alternated with the direst poverty in the slums, people on sick beds and death beds, in hospitals and in funeral processions; life pictures of successes and failures, of the discouraged, the despondent, the cheerful, the optimist and the pessimist, passed in quick succession and stamped themselves on the brains of his eager hearers.
— from Pushing to the Front by Orison Swett Marden

But when Felix saw that this quarrel was become a kind of war, he came upon them on the sudden, and desired the Jews to desist; and when they refused so to do, he armed his soldiers, and sent them out upon them, and slew many of them, and took more of them alive, and permitted his soldiers to plunder some of the houses of the citizens, which were full of riches.
— from Antiquities of the Jews by Flavius Josephus

It will be seen, even on the small scale of these plans, that the general arrangement of the palace, the park, the lakes (including that in the city, which appears in Ramusio's version), the bridge, the mount, etc., in the existing Peking, very closely correspond with Polo's indications; and I think the strong probability is that the Ming really built on the old traces, and that the lake, mount, etc., as they now stand, are substantially those of the Great Mongol, though Chinese policy or patriotism may have spread the belief that the foreign traces were obliterated.
— from The Travels of Marco Polo — Volume 1 by Rustichello of Pisa

Not that faire field Of Enna , where Proserpin gathring flours Her self a fairer Floure by gloomie Dis Was gatherd, which cost Ceres all that pain To seek her through the world; nor that sweet Grove Of Daphne by Orontes , and th’ inspir’d Castalian Spring might with this Paradise Of Eden strive; nor that Nyseian Ile Girt with the River Triton , where old Cham , Whom Gentiles Ammon call and Libyan Jove , Hid Amalthea and her Florid Son Young Bacchus from his Stepdame Rhea’s eye; Nor where Abassin Kings thir issue Guard, Mount Amara , though this by som suppos’d True Paradise under the Ethiop Line By Nilus head, enclos’d with shining Rock, A whole dayes journey high, but wide remote From this Assyrian Garden, where the Fiend Saw undelighted all delight, all kind Of living Creatures new to sight and strange: Two of far nobler shape erect and tall, Godlike erect, with native Honour clad In naked Majestie seemd Lords of all, And worthie seemd, for in thir looks Divine The image of thir glorious Maker shon, Truth, Wisdome, Sanctitude severe and pure, Severe, but in true filial freedom plac’t; Whence true autoritie in men; though both Not equal, as thir sex not equal seemd; For contemplation hee and valour formd, For softness shee and sweet attractive Grace, Hee for God only, shee for God in him: His fair large Front and Eye sublime declar’d Absolute rule; and Hyacinthin Locks Round from his parted forelock manly hung Clustring, but not beneath his shoulders broad: Shee as a vail down to the slender waste Her unadorned golden tresses wore Dissheveld, but in wanton ringlets wav’d As the Vine curles her tendrils, which impli’d Subjection, but requir’d with gentle sway, And by her yeilded, by him best receivd, Yeilded with coy submission, modest pride, And sweet reluctant amorous delay.
— from Paradise Lost by John Milton

As soon as he heard of the capture of the walls, fearing for the Peloponnesians in Nisaea and the safety of Megara, he sent to the Boeotians to meet him as quickly as possible at Tripodiscus, a village so called of the Megarid, under Mount Geraneia, and went himself, with two thousand seven hundred Corinthian heavy infantry, four hundred Phliasians, six hundred Sicyonians, and such troops of his own as he had already levied, expecting to find Nisaea not yet taken.
— from The History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides

I am sure I should as soon think of going to look for any body in the other world.'
— from The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Ward Radcliffe

Lenient, who was short and stout, took off his kepi, laid himself on his stomach, and, putting his face on the floor, looked at the black cavity under the bed, and then, suddenly, he exclaimed: “All right, here we are!”
— from Complete Original Short Stories of Guy De Maupassant by Guy de Maupassant

To load the boat with provisions and arms, to push it out to sea, and ship the oars, was the work of an instant.
— from Twenty Thousand Leagues under the Sea by Jules Verne

I looked at her quiet face and diminutive form, and thought how easy it would be for me to pick up two or three such little bodies as she, and set them outside of the door!
— from History of the Donner Party: A Tragedy of the Sierra by C. F. (Charles Fayette) McGlashan

She beckoned Edward to come to her side, and standing there, one hand resting on the little iron railing, he listened while the lady told him of her disbelief in no undecided voice.
— from The Princess Galva: A Romance by David Whitelaw

They are for one thing almost the finest example in English of that style which follows the sinuosities and subtle transitions of the spoken word.
— from Shelburne Essays, Third Series by Paul Elmer More

This at least was how Falconer afterwards interpreted the sudden changes from gladness to gloom which he saw at such times on her countenance.
— from Robert Falconer by George MacDonald

He and Lincoln clerked in the same store and slept together on the same cot.
— from Abraham Lincoln: Was He a Christian? by John E. (John Eleazer) Remsburg

He said he had acted on a momentary impulse—which Vane did not believe,—and, at any rate, nothing of the kind need be apprehended again; but as for apologising, he should as soon think of blacking George’s boots.
— from Mr. Witt's Widow: A Frivolous Tale by Anthony Hope

For this is what is on me, as it seems to me -- either that I must see the light of day no more, or must live to be a scorn and sorrow to one for whom it were meet that a man should die."
— from Havelok the Dane A Legend of Old Grimsby and Lincoln by Charles W. (Charles Watts) Whistler

Lightness of voice went with the smile, and, superficially, the old manner of holding out a sugar-plum to a child.
— from Paths of Judgement by Anne Douglas Sedgwick

Because, if I am not mistaken, we shall have to say that B about men poets and story-tellers are guilty of making the gravest misstatements when they tell us that wicked men are often happy, and the good miserable; and that injustice is profitable when undetected, but that justice is a man’s own loss and another’s gain—these things we shall forbid them to utter, and command them to sing and say the opposite.
— from The Republic of Plato by Plato

who shall tempt with wandring feet The dark unbottom'd infinite Abyss And through the palpable obscure find out His uncouth way, or spread his aerie flight Upborn with indefatigable wings Over the vast abrupt, ere he arrive The happy Ile; what strength, what art can then 410 Suffice, or what evasion bear him safe Through the strict Senteries and Stations thick Of Angels watching round?
— from The Poetical Works of John Milton by John Milton