It will easily be conceived that the honest M. Gaime was, in a great measure, the original of the Savoyard Vicar; prudence only obliging him to deliver his sentiments, on certain points, with more caution and reserve, and explain himself with less freedom; but his sentiments and councils were the same, not even excepting his advice to return to my country; all was precisely as I have since given it to the pubic.
— from The Confessions of Jean Jacques Rousseau — Complete by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Figuratively, an unanswerable objection: also a machine formerly used in Holland by robbers; it was of iron, shaped like a pear; this they forced into the mouths of persons from whom they intended to extort money; and on turning a key, certain interior springs thrust forth a number of points, in all directions, which so enlarged it, that it could not be taken out of the mouth: and the iron, being case-hardened, could not be filed: the only methods of getting rid of it, were either by cutting the mouth, or advertizing a reward for the key, These pears were also called pears of agony.
— from 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue by Francis Grose

He will easily be convinced that the Gods care for the small as well as the great; for he heard what was said of their goodness and of their having all things under their care.
— from Laws by Plato

These ideas reappear in mediaeval reliefs and pictures wherein the soul is shown as a child or little naked man going out of the dying person’s mouth; [144] and, according to Cædmon, who was educated by Celtic teachers, angels are small and beautiful
— from The Fairy-Faith in Celtic Countries by W. Y. (Walter Yeeling) Evans-Wentz

There, as he rested gathering in a ring, The peers with smiles address'd their unknown king: "Stranger, may Jove and all the aerial powers With every blessing crown thy happy hours!
— from The Odyssey by Homer

A youth of the village of Ch'ueh was employed by Confucius to carry the messages between him and his visitors.
— from The Analects of Confucius (from the Chinese Classics) by Confucius

For a while, as the men scrambled up where each best could, the natives kept up a fire of arrows and darts, yet did not receive them at close quarters, but presently left the position in flight.
— from Anabasis by Xenophon

Dave refused to run quietly on the trail behind the sled, where the going was easy, but continued to flounder alongside in the soft snow, where the going was most difficult, till exhausted.
— from The Call of the Wild by Jack London

The fact, fleeting as it is, is registered in ideal history and no inventory of the world's riches, no true confession of its crimes, would ever be complete that ignored that incident.
— from The Life of Reason: The Phases of Human Progress by George Santayana

From that point the river decreased in size with every branch creek that joined it, and now it had decreased to nothing.
— from Australia Twice Traversed The Romance of Exploration, Being a Narrative Compiled from the Journals of Five Exploring Expeditions into and Through Central South Australia and Western Australia, from 1872 to 1876 by Ernest Giles

In his calmer moments Nestorius confessed, that it might be tolerated or excused by the union of the two natures, and the communication of their idioms : but he was exasperated, by contradiction, to disclaim the worship of a new-born, an infant Deity, to draw his inadequate similes from the conjugal or civil partnerships of life, and to describe the manhood of Christ as the robe, the instrument, the tabernacle of his Godhead.
— from History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire — Volume 4 by Edward Gibbon

By adroit commercial treaties with China, exploitation of the mineral riches of Manchuria and the Korean mines, Japan may, in a very short time, not only make good her war expenditure, but consolidate the economical condition of the empire and increase the general well-being.
— from Empires and Emperors of Russia, China, Korea, and Japan Notes and Recollections by Monsignor Count Vay de Vaya and Luskod by Péter Vay

Should we ever be called to endure the pain of beholding destitute and miserable persons, except where incurable vice had made them such?
— from A Sermon Preached on the Anniversary of the Boston Female Asylum for Destitute Orphans, September 25, 1835 by Jonathan Mayhew Wainwright

"All right?" exclaimed Somers; and, in spite of himself, he actually trembled with emotion, being conscious that a very trying scene was before him—one which would require all his skill and all his energy.
— from Brave Old Salt; or, Life on the Quarter Deck: A Story of the Great Rebellion by Oliver Optic

It will easily be conceived that, though the balance of evil prevailed in the Romish church, this was not the chief reason which produced the reformation.
— from The History of England in Three Volumes, Vol.I., Part C. From Henry VII. to Mary by David Hume

[110] But as the tale was only written a very short time before it appeared, and as the illustration was wanted early, because colours take long to print, Julie could not send the story to be read, but asked Mr. Caldecott to draw her a picture to fit one of the scenes in it.
— from Juliana Horatia Ewing And Her Books by Horatia K. F. Eden

I am sure you had better do willingly that which you will eventually be compelled to do anyway; and besides, there is another thought that has come to me; shall I speak plainly before Lady Jane Bolingbroke?"
— from When Knighthood Was in Flower or, the Love Story of Charles Brandon and Mary Tudor the King's Sister, and Happening in the Reign of His August Majesty King Henry the Eighth by Charles Major