The stone has this privilege, that it carries itself clean off: whereas the other maladies always leave behind them some impression and alteration that render the body subject to a new disease, and lend a hand to one another.
— from Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Complete by Michel de Montaigne

So also I think the gods do often perform benefits secretly, taking a natural delight in bestowing their favours and bounties.
— from Plutarch's Morals by Plutarch

She suddenly leapt up from her chair with an irresistible impulse and held out her hands, yearning towards me, though still timid and not daring to stir....
— from White Nights and Other Stories The Novels of Fyodor Dostoevsky, Volume X by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

"Lo," saith he, "this is the spring that Christian drank of before he went up this hill: and then it was clear and good; but now it is dirty with the feet of some that are not desirous that pilgrims here should quench their thirst.
— from The Pilgrim's Progress by John Bunyan Every Child Can Read by John Bunyan

And then said the angel, Non dicas immunda , que Deus mundavit .
— from The Travels of Sir John Mandeville by Mandeville, John, Sir

Our 'guests' were practically limited to M. Swann, who, apart from a few passing strangers, was almost the only person who ever came to the house at Combray, sometimes to a neighbourly dinner (but less frequently since his unfortunate marriage, as my family did not care to receive his wife) and sometimes after dinner, uninvited.
— from Swann's Way by Marcel Proust

“Why should we be ill, since there are no doctors in the island?” asked Pencroft quite seriously.
— from The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne

You are not a dandy, thank Heaven, so I'm glad to see there are no diamonds or big seal rings on it, only the little old one Jo gave you so long ago.
— from Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

Animals of the socialized type are not dependent for their morale upon the narrow intensities of aggressive rage.
— from Instincts of the Herd in Peace and War by W. (Wilfred) Trotter

"Sleep tight, and no dreams, mind you."
— from Buffalo Roost A Story of a Young Men's Christian Association Boys' Department by Frank H. (Frank Howbert) Cheley

Sweeter far than aught of sweet that April nurses Deep in dew-dropt woodland folded fast and furled Breathes the fragrant song whose burning dawn disperses Darkness, like the surge of armies backward hurled, [Pg 222] Even as though the touch of spring's own hand, that pierces Earth with life's delight, had hidden in the impearled Golden bells and buds and petals of his verses All the breath of all the flowers in all the world.
— from Studies in Song, A Century of Roundels, Sonnets on English Dramatic Poets, The Heptalogia, Etc. From Swinburne's Poems Volume V. by Algernon Charles Swinburne

He went through the world with strange timidities and no daring stride.
— from Visions and Revisions: A Book of Literary Devotions by John Cowper Powys

I don't know any such thing," and now Davenport put on an assumption of anger.
— from The Rover Boys in the Land of Luck; Or, Stirring Adventures in the Oil Fields by Edward Stratemeyer

She had undertaken to inaugurate a real Commencement with class day and as much form and ceremony as she could introduce in order to create a good school spirit; but such things are not done with the turn of a hand, and the young teacher sadly missed Gardley in all these preparations.
— from A Voice in the Wilderness by Grace Livingston Hill