'My brothers,' said the fugitive, 'Betray me not, and, as I live, The richest pasture I will show, That e'er was grazed on, high or low; Your kindness you will not regret, For well some day I'll pay the debt.' The oxen promised secrecy.
— from Fables of La Fontaine — a New Edition, with Notes by Jean de La Fontaine

If you entertain the supposition that any real success, in great things or in small, ever was or could be, ever will or can be, wrested from Fortune by fits and starts, leave that wrong idea here or leave your cousin Ada here."
— from Bleak House by Charles Dickens

If you see a hand or limb, you know that the trunk to which it belongs is there behind.
— from Essays by Ralph Waldo Emerson by Ralph Waldo Emerson

He does not love you, he only loves your money.
— from The Idiot by Fyodor Dostoyevsky

Here the proper black Benedictine habit (it has of later years been corrupted into the russet habit of a friar) is continued to form the mantling.
— from A Complete Guide to Heraldry by Arthur Charles Fox-Davies

Kiss-me-quick , the name given to the very small bonnets which have of late years become fashionable.
— from The Slang Dictionary: Etymological, Historical and Andecdotal by John Camden Hotten

In place whereof the wrestlings have of later years been kept, and is in part continued at Bartholomew tide.
— from The Survey of London by John Stow

Whereas it is most apparent that the multitude of Coffee Houses of late years set up and kept within this kingdom, the dominion of Wales, and town of Berwick-upon-Tweed, and the great resort of Idle and disaffected persons to them, have produced very evil and dangerous effects; as well for that many tradesmen and others, do herein mispend much of their time, which might and probably would be employed in and about their Lawful Calling and Affairs; but also, for that in such houses ... divers false, malitious and scandalous reports are devised and spread abroad to the Defamation of his Majestie's Government, and to the Disturbance of the Peace and Quiet of the Realm; his Majesty hath thought fit and necessary, that the said Coffee Houses be (for the future) Put down, and suppressed, and doth ... strictly charge and command all manner of persons, That they or any of them do not presume from and after the Tenth Day of January next ensuing, to keep any Public Coffee House, or to utter or sell by retail, in his, her or their house or houses (to be spent or consumed within the same) any Coffee, Chocolet, Sherbett or Tea, as they will answer the contrary at their utmost perils ... (all licenses to be revoked).
— from All About Coffee by William H. (William Harrison) Ukers

He seldom spoke to Laurie, but he looked at him often, and a shadow would pass across his face, as if regretting his own lost youth, as he watched the young man in his prime.
— from Little Women by Louisa May Alcott

She held something in her hand,—a wonderful invention of the seventeenth century, improved and perfected in this: a pyramid of sixteen circular hoops of light yet strong steel, attached to each other by cloth bands.
— from The Luck of Roaring Camp and Other Tales With Condensed Novels, Spanish and American Legends, and Earlier Papers by Bret Harte

We have long had stamped kitchen ware, baking pans, and the like; the principle of their manufacture has of late years been extended to ware of more importance.
— from Inventors at Work, with Chapters on Discovery by George Iles

The German unbends for an instant that frigid air of military reserve which has of late years usurped the place of what we used to consider foreign volubility and politeness—he stoops to reply in a whisper, but soon recovers himself, stiffer and straighter than before.
— from General Bounce; Or, The Lady and the Locusts by G. J. (George John) Whyte-Melville

The town has of late years become a favourite summer resort, and its fine situation in a wide valley nearly 2500 feet above sea-level has much to recommend it.
— from Tyrol and Its People by Clive Holland

you know he has our likenesses; you know we gave them to him, suspecting no harm.
— from The Two Elsies A Sequel to Elsie at Nantucket by Martha Finley

The portraiture of criminal or even vulgar life, in deeply religious works, is an outrage upon all holy feeling, whether in the example of Alexander VI., who commanded Pinturicchio to introduce into one of the Vatican frescoes his own portrait, kneeling before the ascending Redeemer; [111] or in the case of those painters in Rome whose favourite model for the Saviour has of late years been a cobbler, hence known in the streets by the blasphemous name of Jesus Christ.
— from Memoirs of the Dukes of Urbino, Volume 2 (of 3) Illustrating the Arms, Arts, and Literature of Italy, from 1440 To 1630. by James Dennistoun

The challenge of the war with Germany roused him to a height of passion he had never touched before in the outer world; and if the strain of it exhausted his strength, as well it might, it gave him one last year of the fullest and deepest experience, perhaps, that he had ever known.
— from The Letters of Henry James (Vol. I) by Henry James

If we take for example a science which has of late years made rapid strides both in Europe and America, the science of astronomy, we shall not have far to go to find convincing proof that a great portion of the best work that is being done by its votaries is effected by the aid of photography.
— from Scientific American Supplement, No. 484, April 11, 1885 by Various

The praise of superiority is no longer due to the painters of the peninsula, and amidst the precious models which they have around them, few have, of late years, maintained or restored the departing glory of their country.
— from The American Quarterly Review, No. 18, June 1831 (Vol 9) by Various