To their industry, the prosperity of the province, the Sogdiana of the ancients, may in a great measure be ascribed; but the advantages of the soil and climate had been understood and cultivated since the reign of the Macedonian kings.
— 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

An aristocracy, of which I have already treated in the first book, is rightly called so; for a state governed by the best men, upon the most virtuous principles, and not upon any hypothesis, which even good men may propose, has alone a right to be called an aristocracy, for it is there only that a man is at once a good man and a good citizen; while in other states men are good only relative to those states.
— from Politics: A Treatise on Government by Aristotle

These are most impious, and commonly professed atheists, that never use the name of God but to swear by it; that express nought else but epicurism in their carriage, or hypocrisy; with Pentheus they neglect and contemn these rites and religious ceremonies of the gods; they will be gods themselves, or at least socii deorum.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

250 C H A P. LXXXVI I T is a great inconvenience to a man in a haste, that there are three distinct roads between Calais and Paris, in behalf of which there is so much to be said by the several deputies from the towns which lie along them, that half a day is easily lost in settling which you’ll take.
— from The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne

Superstitious people are fond of the relicks of saints and holy men, for the same reason that they seek after types and images, in order to enliven their devotion, and give them a more intimate and strong conception of those exemplary lives, which they desire to imitate.
— from A Treatise of Human Nature by David Hume

But it has been shown, in an earlier Lecture, that the law does not go on the principle that a man is answerable for all the consequences of all his acts.
— from The Common Law by Oliver Wendell Holmes

This division of labour, first dwelt upon by political economists as a social phenomenon, and thereupon recognized by biologists as a phenomenon of living bodies, which they called the "physiological division of labour," is that which in the society, as in the animal, makes it a living whole.
— from Introduction to the Science of Sociology by E. W. (Ernest Watson) Burgess

The time and my intents are savage-wild; More fierce and more inexorable far Than empty tigers or the roaring sea.
— from The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare

There was plenty of time for a walk to Knowlesbury and back again to Welmingham; and there was no person probably in the town who was fitter to assist my inquiries about the character and position of Sir Percival's mother before her marriage than the local solicitor.
— from The Woman in White by Wilkie Collins

So corn is carried to a mill in a poke, and when brought home, ground into meal, the meal remains in the poke, in the houses of poor families, until it is used up.
— from Thirty Years' View (Vol. 2 of 2) or, A History of the Working of the American Government for Thirty Years, from 1820 to 1850 by Thomas Hart Benton

It is not probable that there are many, if any, psalms later than 170-165 B.C. in the Maccabean period; some deny even this possibility, basing their denial on the history of the canon.
— from Introduction to the Old Testament by John Edgar McFadyen

I then persuaded her to accompany me in a ride for pleasure, and conducted her to a house of ill repute, called for a room, and desired not to be disturbed.
— from Life and Confession of Sophia Hamilton Who was Tried, Condemned and Sentenced to be Hung, at Montreal, L. C. on the 4th of August, 1845, for the Perpetration of the Most Shocking Murders and Daring Robberies Perhaps Recorded in the Annals of Crime by William H. Jackson

I did not say that I did not care whether a play was moral or immoral, for I have always been of Verhaeren’s opinion that a masterpiece is a portion of the conscience of mankind.
— from The Collected Works in Verse and Prose of William Butler Yeats, Vol. 4 (of 8) The Hour-glass. Cathleen ni Houlihan. The Golden Helmet. The Irish Dramatic Movement by W. B. (William Butler) Yeats

Long stripes or large pieces of work, can be mounted on waxcloth, but we cannot recommend shortening the preparatory work in this manner, as the squares of netting are never so regular as when they are made in a frame.
— from Encyclopedia of Needlework by Thérèse de Dillmont

32:4 He received what they handed him, and fashioned it with an engraving tool, and made it a molten calf; and they said, "These are your gods, Israel, which brought you up out of the land of Egypt." 32:5 When Aaron saw this, he built an altar before it; and Aaron made a proclamation, and said, "Tomorrow shall be a feast to Yahweh.
— from The World English Bible (WEB), Complete by Anonymous

In the study of a literary classic we should aim at more than a mere intellectual apprehension of its technique and other external features.
— from Elementary Guide to Literary Criticism by F. V. N. (Franklin Verzelius Newton) Painter

Several years have gone by since we started our work together and Marie is a bigger girl—but Ref hasn't changed one bit.
— from Shaun O'Day of Ireland by Madeline Brandeis

clearly than anything that has been expressly written on the subject, either by Breitkopf or others, the affinity between cards and chess: "If evidence be required to prove that chess was invented by the Hindus, we may be satisfied with the testimony of the Persians; who, though as much inclined as other nations to appropriate the ingenious inventions of a foreign people, unanimously agree, that the game was imported from the west of India, together with the charming fables of Vishnusarman in the sixth century of our era.
— from Facts and Speculations on the Origin and History of Playing Cards by William Andrew Chatto

I made a little faint resistance, but gradually allowed him, without much difficulty, to handle and feel it, to unloosen my trousers and make it appear on the stage.
— from Laura Middleton; Her Brother and her Lover by Anonymous