First, I smiled to myself and felt elate; but this fierce pleasure subsided in me as fast as did the accelerated throb of my pulses.
— from Jane Eyre: An Autobiography by Charlotte Brontë

"In that case," said Sancho, "mind that your worship does not forget this as you did the oath; perhaps the phantoms may take it into their heads to amuse themselves once more with me; or even with your worship if they see you so obstinate."
— from Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

These are the only men.
— from The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare

While the town proper, with its population engaged in various trades, callings, and professions, and with a store or depôt in each ward, offers the most natural market to the people engaged on the agricultural estate, inasmuch as to the extent to which the townspeople demand their produce they escape altogether any railway rates and charges; yet the farmers and others are not by any means limited to the town as their only market, but have the fullest right to dispose of their produce to whomsoever they please.
— from Garden Cities of To-Morrow Being the Second Edition of "To-Morrow: a Peaceful Path to Real Reform" by Howard, Ebenezer, Sir

The good nature of the dog is not discouraged, although it often brings upon him only rebuffs; the abusive treatment of man never offends him, because he loves man.
— from Dictionary of Quotations from Ancient and Modern, English and Foreign Sources Including Phrases, Mottoes, Maxims, Proverbs, Definitions, Aphorisms, and Sayings of Wise Men, in Their Bearing on Life, Literature, Speculation, Science, Art, Religion, and Morals, Especially in the Modern Aspects of Them by Wood, James, Rev.

how I hate him!—For, at first, as you'll see by what I have written, he would have made me believe other things; and this of Mr. Williams, I suppose, came into his head after he walked out from his closet, to give himself time to think how to delude me better: but the covering was now too thin, and easy to be seen through.
— from Pamela, or Virtue Rewarded by Samuel Richardson

Where there are two or more scriveners in an office, they assist each other in this examination, one reading from the copy, the other holding the original.
— from Bartleby, the Scrivener: A Story of Wall-Street by Herman Melville

As they were tattling thus together after their own manner of chat, behold!
— from Gargantua and Pantagruel by François Rabelais

Had it been the good pleasure of him who disposes of our lots—and thou no sufferer by the knowledge, I had been 170 well content that thou should’st have dipp’d the pen this moment into the ink, instead of myself; but that not being the case———Mrs Shandy being now close beside me, preparing for bed——I have thrown together without order, and just as they have come into my mind, such hints and documents as I deem may be of use to thee; intending, in this, to give thee a token of my love; not doubting, my dear Toby, of the manner in which it will be accepted.
— from The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman by Laurence Sterne

What strict belief should we have, upon the other hypothesis, as to the existence and power of evil spirits; or the eternity of punishment; or what rule for the observance of the Lord’s Day (save just as any other holy-day); or what mode of ascertaining the Church’s mind upon very many other subjects which have arisen or may arise, especially with regard to the pantheistic tendencies and theories of modern times, not treated of because utterly unknown and uncontemplated in the sixteenth century, if we were tied down to the mere wording of the reformation documents, but which are all of them capable of refutation in the broad expanse of doctrine preserved from the beginning!
— from A Second Letter to the Rev. William Maskell, M.A. Some thoughts on the position of the Church of England, as to her dogmatic teaching by Mayow Wynell Mayow

Their capital, Cordova, with the adjacent towns of Malaga, Almeria, and Murcia, had given birth to more than three hundred writers, and above seventy public libraries were opened in the cities of the Andalusian kingdom.
— from History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire — Volume 5 by Edward Gibbon

Women break into tears as the old man shoots past the grand stand.
— from The Garden of Eden by Max Brand

It happens indeed sometimes to one landing on a tower, that the idea of his not having room to extend his base by moving one of his feet outwards, when he begins to incline, superadds fears to his other inconveniences; which like surprise, joy, or any great degree of sensation, enervates him in a moment, by employing the whole sensorial power, and by thus breaking all the associated trains and tribes of motion.
— from Zoonomia; Or, the Laws of Organic Life, Vol. I by Erasmus Darwin

Did you ever try to cure some little habit, some mere trifle, a trick of manner or twist of the finger, or some attitude or tone that might be ugly and awkward, and that people told you that it would be better to get rid of?
— from Expositions of Holy Scripture Second Corinthians, Galatians, and Philippians Chapters I to End. Colossians, Thessalonians, and First Timothy. by Alexander Maclaren

'To make you forget all you had gone through,' answered the old man, smiling, 'and only remember the beating.
— from Chatterbox, 1905. by Various

He trusted that this might be accomplished without collision; but if resisted, then the force necessary to attain the object must be applied.
— from Life of James Buchanan, Fifteenth President of the United States. v. 2 (of 2) by George Ticknor Curtis

I have strongly advised M. Agassiz not to accept the offers made to him at Paris since M. Cuvier's death, and his decision has anticipated my advice.
— from Louis Agassiz: His Life and Correspondence by Louis Agassiz

"These and the other moneys of which I have already rendered account are now before you, Meester Barclay."
— from The Hermit Doctor of Gaya: A Love Story of Modern India by I. A. R. (Ida Alexa Ross) Wylie