"Preterite" Quotes from Famous Books
 ... hight was called, and seems to present an instance of the participle being used in a passive sense without the so-called verb substantive. Yet it does no such thing. The word is no participle at all; but a simple preterite. Certain verbs are naturally either passive or active, as one of two allied meanings may predominate. To be called is passive; so is, to be beaten. But, to bear as a name is active; so is, to take a beating. ...
— A Handbook of the English Language • Robert Gordon Latham
... historian with his Facile evenit quod Dis cordi est,) it seems to me a suitable occasion to withdraw our minds a moment from the confusing din of battle to objects of peaceful and permanent interest. Let us not neglect the monuments of preterite history because what shall be history is so diligently making under our eyes. Cras ingens iterabimus aequor; to-morrow will be time enough for that stormy sea; to-day let me engage the attention of your readers with the Runick inscription ...
— The Complete Poetical Works of James Russell Lowell • James Lowell |
