They are not so coarse, these speeches; they seem to me about as fine as the circumstances would permit!
— from On Heroes, Hero-Worship, and the Heroic in History by Thomas Carlyle

To be brief, last of all she has commanded me to go through all the provinces of Spain and compel all the knights-errant wandering therein to confess that she surpasses all women alive to-day in beauty, and that I am the most valiant and the most deeply enamoured knight on earth; in support of which claim I have already travelled over the greater part of Spain, and have there vanquished several knights who have dared to contradict me; but what I most plume and pride myself upon is having vanquished in single combat that so famous knight Don Quixote of La Mancha, and made him confess that my Casildea is more beautiful than his Dulcinea; and in this one victory I hold myself to have conquered all the knights in the world; for this Don Quixote that I speak of has vanquished them all, and I having vanquished him, his glory, his fame, and his honour have passed and are transferred to my person; for The more the vanquished hath of fair renown, The greater glory gilds the victor's crown.
— from Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

Besides the sacred things, there are words and sounds which have the same character; they should not pass the lips of the profane or enter their ears.
— from The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life by Émile Durkheim

To mark, in the progress of things, the moment at which right took the place of violence and nature became subject to law, and to explain by what sequence of miracles the strong came to submit to serve the weak, and the people to purchase imaginary repose at the expense of real felicity.
— from The Social Contract & Discourses by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Up rose nine seniors, chosen to survey The future games, the judges of the day With instant care they mark a spacious round And level for the dance the allotted ground: The herald bears the lyre: intent to play, The bard advancing meditates the lay.
— from The Odyssey by Homer

The notion of a tree, perhaps of a particular kind of tree (for some savages have no word for tree in general), or even of an individual tree, is sufficiently concrete to supply a basis from which by a gradual process of generalisation the wider idea of a spirit of vegetation might be reached.
— from The Golden Bough: A Study of Magic and Religion by James George Frazer

But the mere thought of such separation fevered his spirit much, and in the evening he said, with the stillness of suspense: “Have you seen Mr. Farfrae to-day, Elizabeth?” Elizabeth-Jane started at the question; and it was with some confusion that she replied “No.”
— from The Mayor of Casterbridge by Thomas Hardy

Who was it that threw sand in my face? 2 [A13B; c6] spread, cause to spread.
— from A Dictionary of Cebuano Visayan by John U. Wolff

May the same love and emotions that was your polar star when in search of each other still continue to shine.
— from Hawk's Nest; or, The Last of the Cahoonshees. A Tale of the Delaware Valley and Historical Romance of 1690. by James M. (James Martin) Allerton

L’une fait tort à l’autre; et monsieur le curé De quelque nouveau saint charge toujours son prôné.”
— from The History of the Crusades (vol. 3 of 3) by J. Fr. (Joseph Fr.) Michaud

"I do not seek to alter your determination, mother, but as for myself, so long as I can lift a sword I shall continue to struggle against the Romans.
— from Beric the Briton : a Story of the Roman Invasion by G. A. (George Alfred) Henty

They were shaking convulsively, those shoulders; and she had buried her face in her hands to keep from gazing at the ghastly carnage.
— from The Red Hell of Jupiter by Paul Ernst

"The moment a single pie is disturbed," he said to me, "I shall close the steel door from the inside, and you and Miss Barrison will then dump the rosium oxide and the strontium into the tank, clap on the lid, turn the nozzle of the hose on the cage, and spray it thoroughly.
— from In Search of the Unknown by Robert W. (Robert William) Chambers

Had they possessed the same characteristic, the same singularity, and been far less brilliant they would have elicited immense admiration.
— from Graham's Magazine, Vol. XLI, No. 4, October 1852 by Various

What manner of men would ye be to help Odysseus, if he should come thus suddenly, I know not whence, and some god were to bring him?
— from The Odyssey of Homer, Done into English Prose by Homer

They hover aloft in the air, their head persistently turned to the home; they describe great soaring circles that suddenly sink beneath the weight of regret; and their thirteen thousand eyes will question, reflect, and retain the trees and the fountain, the gate and the walls, the neighbouring windows and houses, till at last the aerial course whereon their return shall glide have become as indelibly stamped in their memory as though it were marked in space by two lines of steel.
— from The Life of the Bee by Maurice Maeterlinck

"One mustn't get spots on one's clothes," he admonished, and stuck the berry in his mouth, slowly crunching the seeds between his teeth.
— from The Song of Songs by Hermann Sudermann