Dangers are no more light, if they once seem light; and more dangers have deceived men than forced them; nay, it were better to meet some dangers half-way, though they come nothing near, than to keep too long a watch upon their approaches; for if a man watch too long, it is odds he will fall asleep.
— from Bacon's Essays, and Wisdom of the Ancients by Francis Bacon

“Yes, but loving a man is a different thing to loving a woman.”
— from The Memoirs of Jacques Casanova de Seingalt, 1725-1798. Complete by Giacomo Casanova

One's personal universe hung on the answer, for, if the rupture was real and the new American world could take this sharp and conscious twist towards ideals, one's personal friends would come in, at last, as winners in the great American chariot-race for fame.
— from The Education of Henry Adams by Henry Adams

But others loved as well as he, (Thought I, half-anger’d), and if fate, Unfair, had only fashion’d me As hapless, I had been as great.
— from The Angel in the House by Coventry Patmore

Let the mad poets say whate'er they please Of the sweets of Fairies, Peris, Goddesses, There is not such a treat among them all, Haunters of cavern, lake, and waterfall, As a real woman, lineal indeed From Pyrrha's pebbles or old Adam's seed.
— from Lamia by John Keats

This magnificent image of themselves does not meet the gaze of the Americans at intervals only; it may be said to haunt every one of them in his least as well as in his most important actions, and to be always flitting before his mind.
— from Democracy in America — Volume 2 by Alexis de Tocqueville

All the romances in this library are well-written. 35.
— from Symbolic Logic by Lewis Carroll

The angels patted her hands and feet; and then she felt the cold less, and went on quickly towards the palace of the Snow Queen.
— from Andersen's Fairy Tales by H. C. (Hans Christian) Andersen

All orators are dumb when beauty pleadeth; Poor wretches have remorse in poor abuses; Love thrives not in the heart that shadows dreadeth: Affection is my captain, and he leadeth; And when his gaudy banner is display'd, The coward fights and will not be dismay'd.
— from The Complete Works of William Shakespeare by William Shakespeare

For, what one likes if others like as well, What serves one will when many wills rebel?
— from An Essay on Man; Moral Essays and Satires by Alexander Pope

He looked a weather-beaten hard-featured man, of about six or eight and fifty; with deep lines graven as it were into his face, dark hair, and a stern, keen eye.
— from American Notes by Charles Dickens

There is no need to go into detail over what will happen as the final result of destroying the Land and wounding the Earth.
— from Down with the Cities! by Tadashi Nakashima

Now, looking to other manifestations of Roman energy, we see that whatever force was not employed on present necessities, was given, not as among the Greeks to ideal creation, but to the commemoration of events of public importance, and to the transmission of the lessons as well as of the history of the passing time.
— from The Roman Poets of the Augustan Age: Virgil by W. Y. (William Young) Sellar

I cannot live, and were you to move me, I should only die the sooner."
— from Masterman Ready by Frederick Marryat

His life and work indicated a progress as distinct as it was far reaching.
— from Engraving for Illustration: Historical and Practical Notes by Joseph Kirkbride

He tried to take her hand; but she shrank away from him, trembling a little, and with a frightened look in her face.
— from The Lovels of Arden by M. E. (Mary Elizabeth) Braddon

This creature with the fine open countenance hails from North Borneo but 14 it is said that similar creatures have been seen by earnest philatelists after an evening of study in the billiard room of the Collectors Club, followed by a light supper of broiled lobster and welsh rarebit.
— from What Philately Teaches A Lecture Delivered before the Section on Philately of the Brooklyn Institute of Arts and Sciences, February 24, 1899 by John N. (John Nicholas) Luff

But as far as I can call to mind now, he asked how long since she had left, and whether anything had happened to her." "And did you tell him"—and Paul's voice was almost hoarse as he spoke—"did you tell him of—of what you call her disgrace?" "No," replied the woman harshly.
— from The Day of Judgment by Joseph Hocking

Shall we labour or take our leisure, And who shall inherit treasure, If the measure with which we measure Is meted to us again? I am slow in learning and swift in Forgetting, and I have grown So weary with long sand sifting; T'wards the mist where the breakers moan
— from Poems by Adam Lindsay Gordon by Adam Lindsay Gordon

One had only to see how in those terrible times, when the absurd, dark, evil phenomena of our public life were discussed in his presence, he knitted his thick eyebrows, and how martyred his face looked, and what a deep sorrow shone in his beautiful eyes.
— from Reminiscences of Anton Chekhov by Maksim Gorky