Principally, she was thinking of what a queer thing it was that at one time one was in India in the blazing sun, and then in the middle of the ocean, and then driving in a strange vehicle through strange streets where the day was as dark as the night.
— from A Little Princess Being the whole story of Sara Crewe now told for the first time by Frances Hodgson Burnett

Apparently he was at a loss how to announce himself, for he looked round at last in search of something to buy, so as to gain time, and, as it happened, his eye caught on the almond-comfits, and he boldly asked for a pound of “those things.”
— from Cranford by Elizabeth Cleghorn Gaskell

For neither hadst Thou need of me, nor am I any such good, as to be helpful unto Thee, my Lord and God; not in serving Thee, as though Thou wouldest tire in working; or lest Thy power might be less, if lacking my service: nor cultivating Thy service, as a land, that must remain uncultivated, unless I cultivated Thee: but serving and worshipping Thee, that I might receive a well-being from Thee, from whom it comes, that I have a being capable of well-being.
— from The Confessions of St. Augustine by Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Hippo

"So soon," thought and said the Pope, "as the staff in his hand should bud and blossom, so soon might the soul of Tannhaeuser be saved, and no sooner; and it came to pass not long after that the dry wood of a staff which the Pope had carried in his hand was covered with leaves and flowers."
— from The Renaissance: Studies in Art and Poetry by Walter Pater

Frail is our happiness, if this be so, And Eden were no Eden, thus exposed.
— from Paradise Lost by John Milton

The hairy inhabitants of Lycia, human or bestial, whom Bellerophon conquered, 3 were not meant to be such an abstract expression of the evil principle in nature as the Dragon, and while they are generalised, the [ 383 ] elements included are also limited.
— from Demonology and Devil-lore by Moncure Daniel Conway

He had often so determined before, to be sure, and as often broken his determination; and so it was this time.
— from The Tenant of Wildfell Hall by Anne Brontë

'This was kind, to be sure,' added Ludovico: 'but Sebastian knows he runs no risque in letting the Chevalier out, for, if he can get beyond the bars and iron doors of the castle, he must be cunning indeed.
— from The Mysteries of Udolpho by Ann Ward Radcliffe

The Authority Is To Be Shewne And he that maketh a Covenant with the Author, by mediation of the Actor, not knowing what Authority he hath, but onely takes his word; in case such Authority be not made manifest unto him upon demand, is no longer obliged: For the Covenant made with the Author, is not valid, without his Counter-assurance.
— from Leviathan by Thomas Hobbes

"It's too bad; such a nice young man as you are," said the MAMSELL, who, herself not very sober, was sitting at ease on his knee, swinging her legs.
— from Maurice Guest by Henry Handel Richardson

They were sent to better schools, and their associations were of a better description than those of her neighbors.
— from The Continental Monthly, Vol. 1, No. 6, June, 1862 Devoted To Literature and National Policy by Various

I say, has any thing been said about the wedding?"
— from Malaeska: The Indian Wife of the White Hunter by Ann S. (Ann Sophia) Stephens

There was something of the fragile, finely made puppet about her, he thought, as though she had been refashioned a hundred times by some artisan seeking after perfect delicacy and precision.
— from Circle of Flight by Richard Stockham

Billy set his teeth to keep from crushing her fingers, and together they rode slowly up along the sounding slopes to the beautiful security and comfort of Last’s Holding.
— from Tharon of Lost Valley by Vingie E. (Vingie Eve) Roe

Disbriacáre, to become sober againe.
— from Queen Anna's New World of Words; or, Dictionarie of the Italian and English Tongues by John Florio

It's a poor tale if a widow's property is to be spaded away, and the law say nothing to it.
— from Middlemarch by George Eliot

The beautifully striated and waved surface of the glassy spot, taken in connection with the fact of the noise made by the insects possessing it, would seem to indicate that the fenestrated spot must act as a tympanum.
— from Journals of Two Expeditions of Discovery in North-West and Western Australia, Volume 2 by Grey, George, Sir

He paid away certainly, in his bills for breakages, enough money to buy several aeroplanes.
— from Learning to Fly: A Practical Manual for Beginners by Claude Grahame-White