Up, as I have of late resolved before 7 in the morning and to the office, where all the morning, among other things setting my wife and Mercer with much pleasure to worke upon the ruling of some paper for the making of books for pursers, which will require a great deale of worke and they will earn a good deale of money by it, the hopes of which makes them worke mighty hard.
— from The Diary of Samuel Pepys — Complete by Samuel Pepys

WHICH ALTHOUGH IN THEIR WAY, EVEN AS GOOD CUSTOMS AS MARRIAGE ITSELF, ARE NOT QUITE SO RELIGIOUSLY KEPT UP, IN THESE DEGENERATE TIMES A s brisk as bees, if not altogether as light as fairies, did the four Pickwickians assemble on the morning of the twenty-second day of December, in the year of grace in which these, their faithfully-recorded adventures, were undertaken and accomplished.
— from The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens

In trying to find out where the present indifference started, many ascribe it to Bobo Gilding, to whom entering a great drawing-room was more suggestive of the daily afternoon tea ordeal of his early nursery days, than a voluntary act of pleasure.
— from Etiquette by Emily Post

A good-humoured Christmas Chapter, containing an Account of a Wedding, and some other Sports beside: which although in their Way even as good Customs as Marriage itself, are not quite so religiously kept up, in these degenerate Times 29.
— from The Pickwick Papers by Charles Dickens

Surely never was there witnessed, either among gods or men, a more atrocious deed than this!
— from The Elder Eddas of Saemund Sigfusson; and the Younger Eddas of Snorre Sturleson by Snorri Sturluson

There was evidently a great deal to be said on both sides; in the former case there would be much hardship and uncertainty for owners who could not, many of them, expect to recover the effective use of their property perhaps for years to come, and yet would not be free to set themselves up elsewhere; on the other hand, if such persons were allowed to take their compensation and go elsewhere, the countryside of Northern France would never be put right.
— from The Economic Consequences of the Peace by John Maynard Keynes

This will exhibit a great variety of curious transpositions, and, by having the solutions as we go along, the reader will be saved the trouble of perpetually turning to another part of the book, and will have everything under his eye.
— from Amusements in Mathematics by Henry Ernest Dudeney

Whilst we lie waiting here as those sick men did at the Pool of [2086] Bethesda, till the Angel stirred the water, expecting a good hour, they step between, and beguile us of our preferment.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

In every direction there was stir and excitement: and the news being a complete surprise to everybody, there was everywhere a great and irrepressible anxiety as to the future.
— from The Histories of Polybius, Vol. 1 (of 2) by Polybius

They called the spirit of the beautiful Eurydike to them and said to the [ Pg 81] musician: “Take thy wife Eurydike and go up again to the light of the sun.
— from Herakles, the Hero of Thebes, and Other Heroes of the Myth Adapted from the Second Book of the Primary Schools of Athens, Greece by Mary E. (Mary Elizabeth) Burt

Every movement of hers was made, every posture taken, with ease and grace.
— from Mrs. Day's Daughters by Mary E. Mann

Escovedo, standing upon the drawbridge with Aerschot, administered the oath: "I, Philip, Duke of Aerschot," said the new constable, "solemnly swear to hold this castle for the King, and for no others." To which Escovedo added, "God help you, with all his angels, if you keep your oath; if not, may the Devil carry you away, body and soul."
— from The Rise of the Dutch Republic — Volume 24: 1576-77 by John Lothrop Motley

He began to speak in aphorisms, in words from old Wisdom-Religions, and then, for all they were stories of quite modern happenings, in parables—the woe of the world epitomized, a generalization of its needs, [200] all lines of help synthesized into a world saviour, which, lo! was the world itself.
— from Hagar by Mary Johnston

He had a way of his own, and he didn't care naught about money, but if there was ever a gentleman alive, he was one." Barney seemed much saddened when I told him that Mr. Thoreau had been dead a dozen years.
— from The Story of the Innumerable Company, and Other Sketches by David Starr Jordan

But I am speaking of the new foundations, which have been established only for the saying of prayers and masses; for after their example, even the old foundations have been burdened with like prayers and masses, so that they are of little or no profit; though it is also of God's grace that they too come at last, as they deserve, to the dregs, i. e., to the wailing of organs and of choral singers, and to dead, cold masses, by which the incomes of the worldly endowments are gotten and spent.
— from Works of Martin Luther, with Introductions and Notes (Volume II) by Martin Luther