I WISH you, dearest papa, a very happy new-year, and that your health, so precious in my eyes, may daily improve, for the benefit and happiness of your wife and children, the satisfaction of your true friends, and for the annoyance and vexation of your enemies.
— from The Letters of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart — Volume 01 by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart

The events which took place in Vienna and Berlin, with their apparently momentous results, only moved me as interesting newspaper reports, and the meeting of a Frankfort parliament in the place of the dissolved Bundestag sounded strangely pleasant in my ears.
— from My Life — Volume 1 by Richard Wagner

I wish my lady had not spoken of it: for it has given me a curiosity that is not quite so pretty in me; especially so early in my nuptials, and in a case so long ago past.
— from Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded by Samuel Richardson

The name sounded pleasantly in my ears, and did no little towards my cure by the sentiments it awoke in my breast.
— from The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt, 1725-1798. Complete by Giacomo Casanova

As I went on thus, methought my chaise, the wreck of which look’d stately 29 enough at the first, insensibly grew less and less in its size; the freshness of the painting was no more—the gilding lost its lustre—and the whole affair appeared so poor in my eyes—so sorry!—so contemptible!
— from The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne

Ad haec perpetranda furore rapti ducuntur, cruciatus quosvis tolerant, et mortem, et furore exacerbato audent et ad supplicia plus irritantur, mirum est quantam habeant in tormentis patientiam.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

The sunlight poured in, making everything on the table shine and glitter and the flame of the alcohol lamp disappear altogether.
— from My Antonia by Willa Cather

I should have still persisted if my escape had meant death to the whole body of Venetian guards, and even to the Inquisitors themselves.
— from The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt, 1725-1798. Complete by Giacomo Casanova

In David Livingstone, the great African explorer, I found a congenial fellow-labourer, whose words of appreciation, "What a pity you did not make Africa the scene of your activity!" sounded pleasant in my ears.
— from The story of my struggles: the memoirs of Arminius Vambéry, Volume 2 by Ármin Vámbéry

Hour after hour he would sit, on summer nights, on the doorstep of his shed, pipe in mouth, elbows on knees, thinking of nothing, his mind a dull blank.
— from Derelicts by William John Locke

Her conditional offers to renounce me; the little confidence she places in me; entitle me to ask, What merit can she have with a man, who won her in spite of herself; and who fairly, in set and obstinate battle, took her prisoner?
— from Clarissa Harlowe; or the history of a young lady — Volume 4 by Samuel Richardson

I must' a' got some powder in my eyes last night."
— from Marsena, and Other Stories of the Wartime by Harold Frederic

Offsets are but sparingly produced by this species; propagation is more easily carried out by seed, from which plants will sometimes flower the first year.
— from Hardy Perennials and Old Fashioned Flowers Describing the Most Desirable Plants, for Borders, Rockeries, and Shrubberies. by J. G. (John George) Wood

I wish now there were more such purposes in my empty life.
— from The Doctor's Daughter by Vera

It is impossible that birds of long flight crossing over should not have conveyed the seeds and eggs of some plants, insects, mollusca, etc.
— from Alfred Russel Wallace: Letters and Reminiscences, Vol. 2 by Alfred Russel Wallace