Not love, but love's delights; not sympathy, but the rapture of the sympathetic mood; not helpfulness, but the sense of self-importance which comes from being around when great trials are to be met and fateful decisions are to be made; not devotion to others, but the complacency with self which intimate connection with others gives: these are the objects at which the sentimentalist really aims.
"Practical Ethics"
William DeWitt Hyde
It is only here and there that a sentimentalist like Elmore stops to pity him; and it is not certain that even he would have sighed over Captain Ehrhardt if he had not been the means of his disappointment.
"A Fearful Responsibility and Other Stories"
William D. Howells
I'm not a sentimentalist.
"Prince Fortunatus"
William Black