I entered and he swung it, and locked it, and took the key out.
— from Great Expectations by Charles Dickens

What you send in a letter, is, as a general rule, intended for the perusal of one person only.
— from The Ladies' Book of Etiquette, and Manual of Politeness A Complete Hand Book for the Use of the Lady in Polite Society by Florence Hartley

[121] Church, who, as often as he pleased (and he was asked to do this by those who desired to [Pg 43] witness so remarkable a phenomenon), on some one imitating the wailings of mourners, became so insensible, and lay in a state so like death, that not only had he no feeling when they pinched and pricked him, but even when fire was applied to him, and he was burned by it, he had no sense of pain except afterwards from the wound.
— from The City of God, Volume II by Augustine, Saint, Bishop of Hippo

All these little faults of speech, which you are so afraid the children will acquire, are mere trifles; they may be prevented or corrected with the greatest ease, but the faults which are taught them when you make them speak in a low, indistinct, and timid voice, when you are always criticising their tone and finding fault with their words, are never cured.
— from Emile by Jean-Jacques Rousseau

He seized in his immense hands the great body of Jean, straightened it, and laid it across the saddle to carry it back to the chateau; then he went on his way softly, his mind troubled as if he were in a stupor, pursued by horrible and fear-giving images.
— from Complete Original Short Stories of Guy De Maupassant by Guy de Maupassant

I am infinitely delighted in mixing with these several Ministers of Commerce, as they are distinguished by their different Walks and different Languages: Sometimes I am justled among a Body of Armenians ; Sometimes I am lost in a Crowd of Jews ; and sometimes make one in a Groupe of Dutchmen .
— from The Spectator, Volume 1 Eighteenth-Century Periodical Essays by Steele, Richard, Sir

Such were the days, still, hot, heavy, disappearing one by one into the past, as if falling into an abyss for ever open in the wake of the ship; and the ship, lonely under a wisp of smoke, held on her steadfast way black and smouldering in a luminous immensity, as if scorched by a flame flicked at her from a heaven without pity.
— from Lord Jim by Joseph Conrad

But the time was not fully come that the city was to be purged by fire, nor was it far off; for within nine months more I saw it all lying in ashes; when, as some of our quacking philosophers pretend, the seeds of the plague were entirely destroyed, and not before; a notion too ridiculous to speak of here: since, had the seeds of the plague remained in the houses, not to be destroyed but by fire, how has it been that they have not since broken out, seeing all those buildings in the suburbs and liberties, all in the great parishes of Stepney, Whitechappel, Aldgate, Bishopsgate, Shoreditch, Cripplegate, and St Giles, where the fire never came, and where the plague raged with the greatest violence, remain still in the same condition they were in before?
— from A Journal of the Plague Year Written by a Citizen Who Continued All the While in London by Daniel Defoe

" Her cousin, Elbridge G. Lapham, M. C., of New York, says in a letter: "I am persuaded the time is fast hastening when woman will be accorded the exercise of the right your association demands.
— from The Life and Work of Susan B. Anthony (Volume 1 of 2) Including Public Addresses, Her Own Letters and Many From Her Contemporaries During Fifty Years by Ida Husted Harper

It was as though she were sinking in a lake, in a blue sacred lake, mystic as the Lake of San Stefano in the sleeping night, powdered with stars.
— from The Inevitable by Louis Couperus

{1} WITHIN THE GATES ACT I., SCENE I. A library in a city house.
— from Within the Gates by Elizabeth Stuart Phelps

Reckoning, however, the average wages in Berlin at sixteen shillings a week, it will be seen that the artisan, whose necessary outlay for food and lodging need certainly not exceed seven shillings, is at least in as good a position as his self-vaunted brother of London upon thirty shillings.
— from A Tramp's Wallet stored by an English goldsmith during his wanderings in Germany and France by William Duthie

When about nine years old he raised and sold turkeys, and instead of spending the money, probably his first earnings, saved it, and loaned it at seven per cent.
— from Famous Givers and Their Gifts by Sarah Knowles Bolton

"I desire to die, in order that every one may be satisfied; I am living in a state of despair.
— from Queens of the French Stage by H. Noel (Hugh Noel) Williams

"Well, in the first place," he said, slowly, "I am lost in admiration at the rapidity with which Mademoiselle Le Breton does business.
— from Lady Rose's Daughter by Ward, Humphry, Mrs.

They have declared that the Christian patriots' "success in any locality is attended with its total destruction," &c.; but it appears that these totally destroyed places were reserved for Admiral Hope to burn down.
— from Ti-Ping Tien-Kwoh: The History of the Ti-Ping Revolution (Volume II) by Augustus F. Lindley

Lilly, filled with vague and wistful longings, could not stand it any longer indoors, and prepared to go out early.
— from The Song of Songs by Hermann Sudermann