The best of my bodily conditions is that I am flexible and not very obstinate: I have inclinations more my own and ordinary, and more agreeable than others; but I am diverted from them with very little ado, and easily slip into a contrary course.
— from Essays of Michel de Montaigne — Complete by Michel de Montaigne

That seas and waters are enamoured with this our beauty, is all out as likely as that of the air and winds; for when Leander swam in the Hellespont, Neptune with his trident did beat down the waves, but They still mounted up intending to have kiss'd him.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

We have all seen in our own day in England how a certain curious and fascinating type of beauty, invented and emphasised by two imaginative painters, has so influenced Life that whenever one goes to a private view or to an artistic salon one sees, here the mystic eyes of Rossetti’s dream, the long ivory throat, the strange square-cut jaw, the loosened shadowy hair that he so ardently loved, there the sweet maidenhood of ‘The Golden Stair,’ the blossom-like mouth and weary loveliness of the ‘Laus Amoris,’ the passion-pale face of Andromeda, the thin hands and lithe beauty of the Vivian in ‘Merlin’s Dream.’
— from Intentions by Oscar Wilde

This old burg is asleep!”
— from Babbitt by Sinclair Lewis

The poem begins with the striking lines: A thing of beauty is a joy forever; Its loveliness increases; it will never Pass into nothingness; but still will keep A bower quiet for us; and a sleep Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing, which well illustrate the spirit of Keats's later work, with its perfect finish and melody.
— from English Literature Its History and Its Significance for the Life of the English-Speaking World by William J. (William Joseph) Long

Heel easily catch in track or bootlace in a cog.
— from Ulysses by James Joyce

And this demonstration is just the thing for me for that other book I am writing, the 'Supplement to Polydore Vergil on the Invention of Antiquities;' for I believe he never thought of inserting that of cards in his book, as I mean to do in mine, and it will be a matter of great importance, particularly when I can cite so grave and veracious an authority as Senor Durandarte.
— from Don Quixote by Miguel de Cervantes Saavedra

The two residences of Ning and Jung were, in these days, it is true, divided by a small street, which served as a boundary line, and there was no communication between them, but this narrow passage was also private property, and not in any way a government street, so that they could easily be connected, and as in the garden of Concentrated Fragrance, there was already a stream of running water, which had been introduced through the corner of the Northern wall, there was no further need now of going to the trouble of bringing in another.
— from Hung Lou Meng, or, the Dream of the Red Chamber, a Chinese Novel, Book I by Xueqin Cao

Side for a great Distance down, the mountains high and rugid on the Lard Side this open bottom is about 2 miles a Short distance below this village is a bad Stoney rapid and appears to be the last in view I observed at this lower rapid the remains of a large and antient Village which I could plainly trace by the Sinks in which they had formed their houses, as also those in which they had buried their fish—from this rapid to the lower end of the portage the river is Crouded with rocks of various Sizes between which the water passes with great velociety createing in maney places large Waves, an Island which is Situated near the Lard.
— from The Journals of Lewis and Clark, 1804-1806 by William Clark

Thus, therefore, the Athenians completed their wall, and commenced their other buildings immediately after the retreat of the Mede.
— from The History of the Peloponnesian War by Thucydides

Before locks were built there was always a sort of race from Rushes to Surly, each boat trying to catch and bump the one before it, and the fun was to try and get the rudders off and have a regular jostle.
— from Boating by Walter Bradford Woodgate

Inasmuch as, years ago, you hunted brave men who through you were condemned to death, which they suffered on the wheel; inasmuch as you wickedly murdered the starving peasants of the parishes of Eaux Tranquilles while in the pursuit of liberty; inasmuch as you resisted the sovereign people and sided with the cut-throats of Versailles, when you participated in the crimes of the Bodyguard; inasmuch as you have been of the party of conspirators against the Revolution, and have plotted with the tyrant Capet and his widow for the Counter-revolution; inasmuch as you are a suspect, inasmuch as you are an emigré ; inasmuch as you are a rich and an aristocrat; inasmuch as you, Germain Lecour, son of François Xavier Lecour, peasant of Canada, and grandson of a butcher of Paris, did thus oppress the people without the excuse of hereditary illusion, but were a cheat and adventurer sprung from their own bosom; inasmuch as in order to do so you have broken many laws of the land and natural rights of mankind, have outraged the sacred names of Liberty, Equality, and Fraternity, and have brought, especially upon yourself, the retribution of that Order of the Galley-on-Land, part of which was assembled before you in the cave of Fontainebleau; know now then, for the first time, that through all these dealings you have been tracked by them in your every movement; that your misdeeds were collected, not forgotten; that our vengeance was on your path and waited but the time that suited us; that to hundreds unknown to you it will be a day of feasting to see you die; that they will drink wine for your blood and eat bread for your flesh, and when your head drops into the basket, they will regret the days of tyranny for this only—that the humanity of these times does not allow of breaking you in turn on the wheel."
— from The False Chevalier or, The Lifeguard of Marie Antoinette by W. D. (William Douw) Lighthall

A straight bill is readily distinguishable from an order bill on railroads in most parts of the country, at least, because uniform bills of lading are now in use, and the straight bill is always white and the order bill is always yellow.
— from Commercial Law by Richard William Hill

Then follow me if thou canst; for methinks the tide of battle is about to turn, and that soon I may have the power as well as the will to reward those faithful and loyal servants who have followed me in the days of adversity."
— from A Clerk of Oxford, and His Adventures in the Barons' War by Evelyn Everett-Green

Only with new science could come the rational challenge; and even men like Bacon, who consciously strove after scientific method, remained partly prepossessed by the old belief in astral forces.
— from A Short History of Christianity Second Edition, Revised, With Additions by J. M. (John Mackinnon) Robertson

Yamadori is a wealthy Japanese citizen of New York in the book and play and a prince in the opera, but in all he is smitten with Butterfly's beauty and wants to add her name to the list of wives he has conveniently married and as conveniently divorced on his visits to his native land.
— from A Second Book of Operas by Henry Edward Krehbiel

“The population and the wealth of a country may (they observe) both increase, and increase rapidly; but if the former proceeds in a greater ratio than the latter, an increase of distress among the poor may be concurrent with an augmentation of national wealth.”
— from A history of the Irish poor law, in connexion with the condition of the people by Nicholls, George, Sir

At the end of this time the cheese is turned from the bag into a bowl; then to every pint of the cheesy substance a tablespoon of butter is added and enough salt to season it palatably.
— from The International Jewish Cook Book 1600 Recipes According to the Jewish Dietary Laws with the Rules for Kashering; the Favorite Recipes of America, Austria, Germany, Russia, France, Poland, Roumania, Etc., Etc. by Florence Kreisler Greenbaum

It dinged his mood, of course, so that the red under his eyes and the folds of his crumply cheeks—which seemed to speak of a touch of bloodhound introduced a long way back into his breeding—drew deeper and more manifest.
— from Studies and Essays: Quality, and Others by John Galsworthy

Their usual time of beginning is about two hours before sunset, and the dance not unfrequently lasts all night.
— from Travels of Richard and John Lander into the interior of Africa, for the discovery of the course and termination of the Niger From unpublished documents in the possession of the late Capt. John William Barber Fullerton ... with a prefatory analysis of the previous travels of Park, Denham, Clapperton, Adams, Lyon, Ritchie, &c. into the hitherto unexplored countries of Africa by Robert Huish