This actually happened to David Hume, though he did not conceive the question in its entire universality as is done here, and as must be done, should the answer be decisive for all Metaphysics.
— from Kant's Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysics by Immanuel Kant

So to the office, having staid as long as I could, and there sat all the morning, and then home at noon to dinner, and then abroad, Balty with me, and to White Hall, by water, to Sir G. Carteret, about Balty’s L1500 contingent money for the fleete to the West Indys, and so away with him to the Exchange, and mercers and drapers, up and down, to pay all my scores occasioned by this mourning for my mother; and emptied a L50 bag, and it was a joy to me to see that I am able to part with such a sum, without much inconvenience; at least, without any trouble of mind.
— from The Diary of Samuel Pepys — Complete by Samuel Pepys

It was like a little Gibraltar, and any vessel anchored off the islet would inevitably be exposed to the fire of this aerial battery.
— from The Mysterious Island by Jules Verne

at once in his life-time to a blind charity.
— from The Works of Charles and Mary Lamb — Volume 2 Elia and The Last Essays of Elia by Charles Lamb

She had picked up a small flat piece of wood, which happened to have in it a little hole that had evidently suggested to her the idea of sticking in another fragment that might figure as a mast and make the thing a boat.
— from The Turn of the Screw by Henry James

When the sun sets, the earth and the air over it lose their warmth quickly, while the sea remains at practically the same temperature as before.
— from How it Works Dealing in simple language with steam, electricity, light, heat, sound, hydraulics, optics, etc., and with their applications to apparatus in common use by Archibald Williams

V Further; just as in respect of the different virtues some men are termed good in respect of a certain inward state, others in respect of acts of working, so is it in respect of Friendship: I mean, they who live together take pleasure in, and impart good to, one another: but they who are asleep or are locally separated do not perform acts, but only are in such a state as to act in a friendly way if they acted at all: distance has in itself no direct effect upon Friendship, but only prevents the acting it out: yet, if the absence be protracted, it is thought to cause a forgetfulness even of the Friendship: and hence it has been said, “many and many a Friendship doth want of intercourse destroy.”
— from The Ethics of Aristotle by Aristotle

The ascent by the river to Antioch is performed in one day.
— from The Geography of Strabo, Volume 3 (of 3) Literally Translated, with Notes by Strabo

Unable to subdue the earl of Thoulouse openly, the king of France, and queen mother, and three archbishops, raised another formidable army, and had the art to persuade the earl of Thoulouse to come to a conference, when he was treacherously seized upon, made a prisoner, forced to appear bare-footed and bare-headed before his enemies, and compelled to subscribe an abject recantation.
— from Fox's Book of Martyrs Or A History of the Lives, Sufferings, and Triumphant Deaths of the Primitive Protestant Martyrs by John Foxe

At the same time, a Blush is unfashionable, and Silence more ill-bred than any thing that can be spoken.
— from The Spectator, Volume 1 Eighteenth-Century Periodical Essays by Steele, Richard, Sir

Ha, ha—I—I saw the glare of the light—the ruddy hue of the fire, and I knew then that Andrew Britton was trying once again to burn the body—but he can’t—he can’t.
— from Ada, the Betrayed; Or, The Murder at the Old Smithy. A Romance of Passion by James Malcolm Rymer

I have been greatly interested in looking alternately over the shoulders of two artists, both sketching in colour the same, absolutely the same scene, both trying to represent it with all the truth in their power.
— from The Seaboard Parish Volume 1 by George MacDonald

And the day before yesterday, when he was coming and brought me the Moliere, he stopped and gave money to a beggar, and how charmingly, sure, he reads the French!
— from The Virginians by William Makepeace Thackeray

[pg 250] for the men cannot use their sou’westers for the purpose when both hands are so busily employed in freeing their oars from the seas and keeping the blades from being blown up into the air by the force of the gale.
— from The Sea: Its Stirring Story of Adventure, Peril, & Heroism. Volume 2 by Frederick Whymper

Had we been made prisoners, it would, of course, have been possible to appeal both to the English and Russian Governments; but the journeys to and from Constantinople and St. Petersburg are very long, and as it would require some weeks to procure the necessary money, we should have had to lead a wretched existence amongst the mountains, making more experiences about wild Circassian life than would probably have pleased us.
— from Turkish Harems & Circassian Homes by Andrée Hope

This collection, printed by Simon de Colines, is dedicated to a bishop!—to Francois Bohier, the brother of the man who, to save his credit at court and redeem his offence, offered to Diane, on the accession of Henri II., the chateau de Chenonceaux, built by his father, Thomas Bohier, a councillor of state under four kings: Louis XI., Charles VIII., Louis XII., and Francois I. What were the pamphlets published against Madame de Pompadour and against Marie-Antoinette compared to these verses, which might have been written by Martial?
— from The Works of Balzac: A linked index to all Project Gutenberg editions by Honoré de Balzac

My father, who saw clearly that the miserable farm of H—— could not support him and his family, and had been obliged to remain there hitherto only from want of a better abode, rejoiced very much at the announcement, because he hoped that Mohilna would offer him a place of refuge, especially as the arendant was a brother-in-law of my uncle.
— from Solomon Maimon: An Autobiography. by Solomon Maimon

Only a few trenches and barbed wire entanglements marred the scene.
— from Germany, The Next Republic? by Carl W. (Carl William) Ackerman

It would sort of—I mean—Oh, but you needn't, if you don't want to." §3 That night there happened in Bramhall House one of those strange events that are best chronicled in a few cold sentences.
— from Tell England A Study in a Generation by Ernest Raymond

Between the trunks and boughs gleamed crimson patches of the horizon, and against this vivid background, the trees seemed still more gloomy, and wasted away.
— from Orlóff and His Wife: Tales of the Barefoot Brigade by Maksim Gorky