I, who have no sisters or brothers, look with some degree of innocent envy on those who may be said to be born to friends.

I am sensible that my keenness of temper, and a vanity to be distinguished for the day, make me too often splash in life.... I amresolved to restrain myself and attend more to decorum.

If a man is prodigal, he cannot be truly generous.

I am now to offer some thoughts upon that sameness or familiarity which we frequently find between passages in different authors without quotation. This may be one of three things either what is called Plagiarism, or Imitation, or Coincidence.

If venereal delight and the power of propagating the species were permitted only to the virtuous, it would make the world very good.

Boswell, when he speaks of his Life of Johnson, calls it my magnum opus, but it may more properly be called his opera, for it is truly a composition founded on a true story, in which there is a hero with a number of subordinate characters, and an alternate succession of recitative and airs of various tone and effect, all however in delightful animation.

What an insignificant life is this which I am now leading!