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下人は、頸｛くび｝をちぢめながら、山吹｛やまぶき｝の汗袗｛かざみ｝に重ねた、紺の襖｛あお｝の肩を高くして門のまわりを見まわした。雨風の患｛うれえ｝のない、人目にかかる惧｛おそれ｝のない、一晩楽にねられそうな所があれば、そこでともかくも、夜を明かそうと思ったからである。「羅生門、　芥川龍之介」

Second sentence (from 雨風の...) looks like ｛下人は｝Xと思った, where X describes 下人's thought process ("If there were ... he'd spend the night there").

The sentences with からである that I've seen roughly involve a cause/reason, something like AはBからである - the reason for A is B. However, I can't see anything explicit (no A, so to speak) here to suggest the thing that could have spurred 下人's train of thought.

Question: how is からである used here? Why didn't the sentence end at 思った?

user9771
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You must be either reading too much into this or seeing something that is just not there, both of which could easily occur in foreign language study.

When a sentence ends with 「～～からである」, it can only express a reason or cause for an event/situation that is described in the previous sentence(s) -- most often, in the sentence immediately before the one ending with 「～～からである」.

how is からである used here?

In this passage, the first sentence describes an action and the second, the reason for that action.

"(He) looked hard around the gate (in such and such manners). That is because he wanted to spend the night (at the safest place possible)."

Both A and B (in your words) are explicit. In prose writing, both would be explicit nearly 100% of the time.

Why didn't the sentence end at 思った?

Because that would sound too abrupt and would not show the relationship between the two sentences.

「思ったのである」 would be better than 「思った」 and even "acceptable" to an extent, but 「思ったからである」 would no doubt be the best. 「思った」 is not a possibility here as it lacks any kind of nuance.