The consequence was that they lost their distinctive dialect, which is now practically extinct.
— from Myths of the Cherokee Extract from the Nineteenth Annual Report of the Bureau of American Ethnology by James Mooney

If enlightened Curiosity ever get sight of the Marseilles Council-Books, will it not perhaps explore this strangest of Municipal procedures; and feel called to fish up what of the Biographies, creditable or discreditable, of these Five Hundred and Seventeen, the stream of Time has not yet irrevocably swallowed?
— from The French Revolution: A History by Thomas Carlyle

Its admirers have need to inquire whether, even in the days of primitive men and morals, true justice flourished in it; or was it not perhaps even then, to use the casual expression of Cicero, rather a coloured painting than the living reality?
— from The City of God, Volume I by Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Hippo

Lord Lucan tells a very good story, which, if not precisely exact, is certainly characteristical: that when the sale of Thrale's brewery was going forward, Johnson appeared bustling about, with an ink-horn and pen in his button-hole, like an excise-man; and on being asked what he really considered to be the value of the property which was to be disposed of, answered, 'We are not here to sell a parcel of boilers and vats, but the potentiality of growing rich, beyond the dreams of avarice.' On Friday, April 6, he carried me to dine at a club, which, at his desire, had been lately formed at the Queen's Arms, in St. Paul's Church-yard.
— from Boswell's Life of Johnson Abridged and edited, with an introduction by Charles Grosvenor Osgood by James Boswell

I am aware that in Rome people are very indulgent on that point, and that, in order to prevent another greater crime (which is not prevented), every cardinal has one or more mistresses, but in Rome the climate requires certain concessions which are not necessary here, where the bottle and the pipe replace all pleasures.
— from The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt, 1725-1798. Complete by Giacomo Casanova

In a commonwealth, where is no public enemy, there is likely civil wars, and they rage upon themselves: this body of ours, when it is idle, and knows not how to bestow itself, macerates and vexeth itself with cares, griefs, false fears, discontents, and suspicions; it tortures and preys upon his own bowels, and is never at rest.
— from The Anatomy of Melancholy by Robert Burton

The child of the married woman is not placed, either by circumstances or by the law, in the power of its mother.
— from Women's Wild Oats: Essays on the Re-fixing of Moral Standards by C. Gasquoine (Catherine Gasquoine) Hartley

Cinereous, beset with numerous long stout black bristles; head white, clothed behind and beneath with white hairs; frontalia deep black, slightly widening towards the face, with stout bristles along each side; facialia without bristles except by the epistoma, which is not prominent; eyes bare; proboscis and palpi tawny; antennæ nearly reaching the epistoma; 3rd joint slightly broader towards the tip, which is rounded, about four times the length of the 2nd;
— from Journal of the Proceedings of the Linnean Society - Vol. 4 Zoology by Linnean Society of London

If I talk to her at all it will be out on the street, which is not pleasant, especially if it is snowing or freezing or blowing a gale.
— from The Trade Union Woman by Alice Henry

The frequent absence of my two Indians, scouring the region for the Sioux, left me to do my own fishing; and fishing with bare hands in frosty weather is not pleasant employment for a youth of soft up-bringing.
— from Lords of the North by Agnes C. Laut

Why was I not permitted, even at the expence of my blood, to ransom so many thousand souls, who fell unhappy victims to avarice or lust?
— from Some Historical Account of Guinea, Its Situation, Produce, and the General Disposition of Its Inhabitants An Inquiry into the Rise and Progress of the Slave Trade, Its Nature and Lamentable Effects by Anthony Benezet

All men complain of this situation, which is not yet war, but which is not peace either, and everybody would like to get out of it.
— from The Kingdom of God is Within You / Christianity and Patriotism / Miscellanies by Tolstoy, Leo, graf

This contains a few letters of Scott's, but only one which is not published elsewhere.
— from Sir Walter Scott as a Critic of Literature by Margaret Ball

To fall into CLEAN water is not pleasant, even when one is trout-fishing; but to be clad in white pants, and suddenly drop nearly knee-deep in the lap of mother Earth is quite a different thing.
— from Helen's Babies by John Habberton