I modestly assented, and we all fell through a little dirty swing door, into a sort of hot packing-case immediately behind it.
— from Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

why, I would have fought as long as breath had been in me; and, had I so done, I am sure you could never have given me the worst on't, for a Christian can never be overcome unless he shall yield of himself.
— from The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan Every Child Can Read by John Bunyan

“Yes, poor fellow,” said my aunt, “it appears that whenever he wants to piddle, and cannot do so at once, it troubles him in that way, and I have had some difficulty in allaying it.
— from The Romance of Lust: A classic Victorian erotic novel by Anonymous

There lie buried in this Friars church, amongst others, Edward, first son to Joan, mother to King Richard II.; Guy de Mericke, Earl of St. Paule; Lucie, Countess of Kent, and one of the heirs of Barnabie Lord of Millaine, with an epitaph; Dame Ide, wife to Sir Thomas West; Dame Margaret West; Stephen Lindericle, esquire; Sir Humfrey Bohun, Earl of Hereford and Essex, Lord of Brekenake; [154] Richard, the great Earl of Arundell, Surrey, and Warren, beheaded, 1397; Sir Edward Arundell, and Dame Elizabeth his wife; Sir Francis Atcourt, [155] Earl of Pembrooke, which married Alice, sister to the Earl of Oxford; Dame Lucie Knowles, of Kent; Sir Peter Garinsers, of France; the Lord John Vere, Earl of Oxford, beheaded on the Tower hill 1463; Aubrey de Vere, son and heir to the Earl of Oxford; Sir Thomas Tudnam, knight; William Bourser; Lord Fitz Warren; Sir Thomas de la Lande, knight; Dame Joan Norris, the Lady of Bedforde; Anne, daughter to John Viscount Welles; Walter Nevell, esquire; Sir John Manners, knight; the wife of Sir David Cradocke, knight; the mother to the Lord Spencer’s wife; Sir Bartlemew Rodlegate; John, son to Sir John Wingfield; Sir Walter Mewes; Robert Newenton, esquire; Philip Spencer, son to Sir Hugh Spencer; Dame Isabell, daughter to Sir Hugh; the Lord Barons slain at Barnet field, buried there 1471.
— from The Survey of London by John Stow

Yet, tho' I spared thee all the spring, 1 Thy sole delight is, sitting still, With that gold dagger of thy bill To fret the summer jenneting.
— from The Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson by Tennyson, Alfred Tennyson, Baron

The severity exercised on this occasion, however, when the poet was suddenly driven into exile, unaccompanied even by the partner of his bed, who had been his companion for many years, was an act so inconsistent with the usual moderation of Augustus, that we cannot justly ascribe it to any other motive than personal resentment; especially as this arbitrary punishment of the author could answer no end of public utility, while the obnoxious production remained to affect, if it really ever did essentially affect, the morals of society.
— from The Lives of the Twelve Caesars, Complete by Suetonius

In Saxon days it was the capital of Wessex.
— from Three Men in a Boat by Jerome K. (Jerome Klapka) Jerome

In every age, such copies, so congenial to human feelings, have been cherished by the zeal of private friendship, or public esteem: the images of the Roman emperors were adored with civil, and almost religious, honors; a reverence less ostentatious, but more sincere, was applied to the statues of sages and patriots; and these profane virtues, these splendid sins, disappeared in the presence of the holy men, who had died for their celestial and everlasting country.
— from The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire Table of Contents with links in the HTML file to the two Project Gutenberg editions (12 volumes) by Edward Gibbon

The only case in which a civil war could arise is, if the army should divide itself into two factions, the one raising the standard of rebellion, the other remaining true to its allegiance.
— from Democracy in America — Volume 2 by Alexis de Tocqueville

Notwithstanding this, the said brazier and his servant did, in the presence of the deponent, eat the said bacon and onions, a small portion of which was observed to remain in the dish.
— from Records of the Spanish Inquisition, Translated from the Original Manuscripts by Andrew Dickson White

Lamb said to the sedan driver, "I thought this was a hearse" and went down the block.
— from Hooded Detective, Volume III No. 2, January, 1942 by Various

Before closing this chapter, let the reader allow me to ask him, if the world in its darkest ages of paganism has ever witnessed such a system of idolatry, so debasing, impious, ridiculous and diabolical in its consequences as the Church of Rome teaches in the dogma of transubstantiation!
— from Fifty Years in the Church of Rome by Charles Paschal Telesphore Chiniquy

Some little boys who were listening threw themselves down, writhing with laughter among the seaweed, and the young girls grew red with embarrassment and stared down into the surf.
— from The Aran Islands by J. M. (John Millington) Synge

Arabs, bootless and shoeless, dressed in their most gaily coloured garments, with long linen bags (containing the required five days’ rations) thrown over their shoulders, shambling in their gait and bewildered in their manner, touched shoulders with equally dispirited Bedouins, evidently suddenly snatched from the desert.
— from Ambassador Morgenthau's Story by Henry Morgenthau

Where Harriet Beecher Stowe witnessed the Scenes depicted in her Uncle Tom's Cabin.
— from The Underground Railroad from Slavery to Freedom: A comprehensive history by Wilbur Henry Siebert

After Mr. S. had sat down, it was moved by Mr. Giles , to take the resolution up in Committee of the Whole for the purpose of more ample discussion.
— from Abridgment of the Debates of Congress, from 1789 to 1856, Vol. 1 (of 16) by United States. Congress

The powerful alkaline properties of caustic soda determine its capacity for combining with even the feeblest acids, its property of disengaging ammonia from ammonium salts, its faculty of forming precipitates from solutions of salts whose bases are insoluble in water, &c.
— from The Principles of Chemistry, Volume I by Dmitry Ivanovich Mendeleyev

The generative rudiment of each side divides into an anterior and a posterior part [Pg 369] ( fig.
— from The Works of Francis Maitland Balfour, Volume 2 (of 4) A Treatise on Comparative Embryology: Invertebrata by Francis M. (Francis Maitland) Balfour

He was several years on the staff of Ireland, and, after having [112] been removed to the Colonelcy of the Seventh Dragoons in 1741, he proceeded in the summer of 1742 to Flanders with the army commanded by Field-Marshal the Earl of Stair.
— from Historical Record of the Fifth Regiment of Foot, or Northumberland Fusiliers Containing an Account of the Formation of the Regiment in 1674, and of Its Subsequent Services to 1837 by Richard Cannon