Laurence Sterne Quotes

Only the brave know how to forgive... a coward never forgave; it is not in his nature.

True Shandeism, think what you will against it, opens the heart and lungs, and like all those affections which partake of its nature, it forces the blood and other vital fluids of the body to run freely thro' its channels, and makes the wheel of life run long and chearfully round.

Respect for ourselves guides our morals, respect for others guides our manners.

For I begin with writing the first sentence, — and trusting to Almighty God for the second.

The cast, staff, and crew of a live theater work together toward a common goal: a good performance. Thus, theater is necessarily a group effort. However, it is never a group effort of vague fellow committee members, but of associated autocrats-a playwright, a producer, a director, a stage manager, designers, and, above all, actors. Each accommodates the others, and may overlap others in function when necessary. But each autocrat assumes distinct responsibilities and accepts them completely.

The circumstances with which every thing in this world is begirt, give every thing in this world its size and shape;--and by tightening it, or relaxing it, this way or that, make the thing to be, what it is--great--little--good--bad--indifferent or not indifferent, just as the case happens.

When a man gives himself up to the government of a ruling passion,--or, in other words, when his HOBBY-HORSE grows head- strong,--farewell cool reason and fair discretion.

Shall we for ever make new books, as apothecaries make new mixtures, by pouring only out of one vessel into another?

Digressions, incontestably, are the sunshine, the life, the soul of reading! Take them out and one cold eternal winter would reign in every page. Restore them to the writer - he steps forth like a bridegroom, bids them all-hail, brings in variety and forbids the appetite to fail.

Solitude is the best nurse of wisdom.

Go, poor devil, get thee gone! Why should I hurt thee? This world surely is wide enough to hold both thee and me.

How many thousands of [lives] are there every year that comes cast away, (in all civilized countries at least)--and consider'd asnothing but common air, in competition of an hypothesis.

A man who values a good night's rest will not lie down with enmity in his heart, if he can help it.

'Tis known by the name of perseverance in a good cause,-and of obstinacy in a bad one.

The histories of the lives and fortunes of men are full of instances of this nature,--where favorable times and lucky accidents have done for them, what wisdom or skill could not.

Sciences may be learned by rote, but wisdom not.

Of all the cants which are canted in this canting world - though the cant of hypocrites may be the worst - the cant of criticism is the most tormenting!

Dear sensibility! Source inexhausted of all that's precious in our joys, or costly in our sorrows! Eternal fountain of our feelings! 'tis here I trace thee and this is thy divinity which stirs within me...All comes from thee, great-great SENSORIUM of the world!

Heaven be their resource who have no other but the charity of the world, the stock of which, I fear, is no way sufficient for the many great claims which are hourly made upon it.

So fruitful is slander in variety of expedients to satiate as well as disguise itself. But if these smoother weapons cut so sore, what shall we say of open and unblushing scandal, subjected to no caution, tied down to no restraints?

Almost one half of our time is spent in telling and hearing evil of one another ... and every hour brings forth something strange and terrible to fill up our discourse and our astonishment.

Any one may do a casual act of good-nature; but a continuation of them shows it a part of the temperament.

Sight is by much the noblest of the senses. We receive our notices from the other four, through the organs of sensation only. We hear, we feel, we smell, we taste, by touch. But sight rises infinitely higher. It is refined above matter, and equals the faculty of spirit.

Precedents are the disgrace of legislation. They are not wanted to justify right measures, are absolutely insufficient to excuse wrong ones. They can only be useful to heralds, dancing masters, and gentlemen ushers.

There is such a torture, happily unknown to ancient tyranny, as talking a man to death. Marcus Aurelius advises to assent readily to great talkers--in hopes, I suppose, to put an end to the argument.

When the precipitancy of a man's wishes hurries on his ideas ninety times faster than the vehicle he rides in--woe be to truth!

The world is ashamed of being virtuous.

What is the life of man! Is it not to shift from side to side? From sorrow to sorrow? To button up one cause of vexation! And unbutton another!

Sweet pliability of man's spirit, that can at once surrender itself to illusions, which cheat expectation and sorrow of their weary moments! - long - long since had ye numbered out my days, had I not trod so great a part of them upon this enchanted ground. When my way is too rough for my feet, or too steep for my strength, I get off it, to some smooth velvet path which fancy has scattered over with rose-buds of delights; and have taken a few turns on it, come back strengthened and refreshed.

When, to gratify a private appetite, it is once resolved upon that an ignorant and helpless creature shall be sacrificed, it is an easy matter to pick up sticks enough from any thicket where it has strayed, to make a fire to offer it up with.

If time, like money, could be laid by while one was not using it, there might be some excuse for the idleness of half of the world, but yet not a full one. For even this would be such an economy as the living on a principal sum, without making it purchase interest.

First, whenever a man talks loudly against religion, always suspect that it is not his reason, but his passions, which have got the better of his creed. A bad life and a good belief are disagreeable and troublesome neighbors, and where they separate, depend upon it, 'Tis for no other cause but quietness sake.

I hate set dissertations,--and above all things in the world, 'tis one of the silliest things in one of them, to darken your hypothesis by placing a number of tall, opake words, one before another, in a right line, betwixt your own and your readers conception.

The most accomplished way of using books is to serve them as some people do lords; learn their titles and then brag of their acquaintance.

I would go fifty miles on foot to kiss the hand of that man whose generous heart will give up the reins of his imagination into his Author's hands; be pleased, he knows not why, and cares not wherefore.

Conversation is a traffick; and if you enter into it, without some stock of knowledge, to ballance the account perpetually betwixtyou,--the trade drops at once: and this is the reasonwhy travellers have so little [good] conversation with natives,--owing to their [the natives'] suspicionthat there is nothing to be extracted from the conversationworth the trouble of their bad language.

There are some tempers--how shall I describe them--formed either of such impenetrable matter, or wrought up by habitual selfishness to such an utter insensibility of what becomes of the fortunes of their fellow-creatures, as if they were not partakers of the same nature, or had no lot or connection at all with the species.

The loneliness is the mother of wisdom.

Writings may be compared to wine. Sense is the strength, but wit the flavor.

All womankind, from the highest to the lowest love jokes; the difficulty is to know how they choose to have them cut; and there is no knowing that, but by trying, as we do with our artillery in the field, by raising or letting down their breeches, till we hit the mark.

The happiness of life may be greatly increased by small courtesies in which there is no parade, whose voice is too still to tease, and which manifest themselves by tender and affectionate looks, and little kind acts of attention.

Injuries come only from the heart.

Lessons of wisdom have the most power over us when they capture the heart through the groundwork of a story, which engages the passions.

An atheist is more reclaimable than a papist, as ignorance is sooner cured than superstition.

A coward never forgives.

I am persuaded ... that both man and woman bear pain or sorrow, (and, for aught I know, pleasure too) best in a horizontal position.

I have undertaken, you see, to write not only my life, but my opinions also; hoping and expecting that your knowledge of my character, and of what kind of a mortal I am, by the one, would give you a better relish for the other: As you proceed further with me, the slight acquaintance which is now beginning betwixt us, will grow into familiarity; and that, unless one of us is in fault, will terminate in friendship.

It is a great pity but tis certain from every day's observation of man, that he may be set on fire like a candle, at either end provided there is a sufficient wick standing out.