Laurence Sterne Quotes - Page 2

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• O blessed Health! thou art above all gold and treasure; 'tis thou who enlargest the soul, and openest all its powers to receive instruction, and to relish virtue. He that has thee has little more to wish for, and he that is so wretched as to want thee, wants everything with thee.

  Laurence Sterne

  Art, Blessed, Health

  Laurence Sterne (1840). “The Works ...: With a Life of the Author”, p.166

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• Nothing is so perfectly amusing as a total change of ideas.

  Laurence Sterne

  Change, Ideas, Literature

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• 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.

  Laurence Sterne

  Evil, Hearing, Half

  Laurence Sterne (1853). “Works ...”, p.588

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

  Laurence Sterne

  Writing, Next, Firsts

  "The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gent: In Three Volumes".

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• Trust that man in nothing who has not a conscience in everything.

  Laurence Sterne

  Men, Conscience

  Laurence Sterne (1859). “The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy: Gentleman & A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy”, p.472

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• 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.

  Laurence Sterne

  Sight, Smell, Four

  Laurence Sterne (1805). “The Works of Laurence Sterne, A. M.: A sentimental journey through France and Italy. The Koran: or, The life, character and sentiments of Tria Juncta in Uno. A political romance”, p.356

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• Solitude is the best nurse of wisdom.

  Laurence Sterne

  Nurse, Solitude, Loner

  Laurence Sterne (1840). “The Works ...: With a Life of the Author”, p.329

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• Freethinkers are generally those who never think at all.

  Laurence Sterne

  Thinking, Infidelity, Freethinker

  Laurence Sterne (1795). “The Works of Laurence Sterne”, p.146

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• There have been no sects in the Christian world, however absurd, which have not endeavoured to support their opinions by arguments drawn from Scripture.

  Laurence Sterne

  Christian, Support, World

  Laurence Sterne (1860). “The Works of Laurence Sterne: Containing The Life and Opinions of Tristam Shandy, Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy, Sermons, Letters, Etc”, p.705

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• Whatever stress some may lay upon it, a death-bed repentance is but a weak and slender plank to trust our all on.

  Laurence Sterne

  Death, Stress, Bed

  Laurence Sterne (1859). “The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy: Gentleman & A Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy”, p.540

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• 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.

  Laurence Sterne

  Men, Skills, Luck

  Laurence Sterne (1873). “The Works of Laurence Sterne ...: With a Life of the Author”, p.90, London : Bickers, H. Sotheran

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• I had had an affair with the moon, in which there was neither sin nor shame.

  Laurence Sterne

  Moon, Sin, Shame

  1768 A Sentimental Journey,'The Monk, Calais'.

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• There are a thousand unnoticed openings, continued my father, which let penetrating eye at once into a man's soul; and I maintain it, added he, that a man of sense does not lay down his hat in coming into a room, --or take it up in going out of it, but something escapes, which discovers him.

  Laurence Sterne

  Father, Eye, Men

  Laurence Sterne (1860). “The Works of Laurence Sterne: Containing The Life and Opinions of Tristam Shandy, Sentimental Journey Through France and Italy, Sermons, Letters, Etc”, p.251

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• Of all duties, prayer certainly is the sweetest and most easy.

  Laurence Sterne

  Prayer, Easy, Duty

  Laurence Sterne (1823). “The Works of Laurence Sterne: With a Life of the Author”, p.239

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• What a large volume of adventures may be grasped within this little span of life by him who interests his heart in every thing, and who, having eyes to see, what time and chance are perpetually holding out to him as he journeyeth on his way, misses nothing he can fairly lay his hands on.

  Laurence Sterne

  Adventure, Eye, Heart

  Laurence Sterne (1832). “The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman”, p.260

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

  Laurence Sterne

  Atheist, Ignorance, Superstitions

  Laurence Sterne (1790). “The Works of Laurence Sterne: Complete in Eight Volumes”, p.146

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• It is not in the power of every one to taste humor, however he may wish it; it is the gift of God! and a true feeler always brings half the entertainment along with him.

  Laurence Sterne

  Humor, Wish, Half

  Laurence Sterne (1834). “The Works of Laurence Sterne, in One Volume”, p.395

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• I often derive a peculiar satisfaction in conversing with the ancient and modern dead, — who yet live and speak excellently in their works. My neighbors think me often alone, — and yet at such times I am in company with more than five hundred mutes — each of whom, at my pleasure, communicates his ideas to me by dumb signs — quite as intelligently as any person living can do by uttering of words.

  Laurence Sterne

  Book, Thinking, Ideas

  Laurence Sterne, James P. Browne (1873). “The Works of Lawrence Sterne: In Four Volumes, with a Life of the Author, Written by Himself”, p.333

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• Only the brave know how to forgive; it is the most refined and generous pitch of virtue human nature can arrive at.

  Laurence Sterne

  Motivational, Forgiveness, Brave

  Laurence Sterne (2013). “Delphi Complete Works of Laurence Sterne (Illustrated)”, Delphi Classics

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• Death opens the gate of fame, and shuts the gate of envy after it; it unlooses the chain of the captive, and puts the bondsman's task into another man's hand.

  Laurence Sterne

  Death, Men, Hands

  Laurence Sterne (1849). “The Works of Laurence Sterne: Containing The Life and Opinions of Tristan Shandy ... [etc.] ; with a Life of the Author Written by Himself”, p.155

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• So much of motion, is so much of life, and so much of joy, and to stand still, or get on but slowly, is death and the devil.

  Laurence Sterne

  Joy, Devil, Literature

  Laurence Sterne (1996). “Tristram Shandy”, p.345, Wordsworth Editions

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• 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.

  Laurence Sterne

  Time, Would Be, Half

  Laurence Sterne (1803). “The Works of Laurence Sterne ...: With a Life of the Author, Written by Himself ...”, p.137

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• So long as a man rides his hobbyhorse peaceably and quietly along the King's highway, and neither compels you or me to get up behind him - pray, Sir, what have either you or I to do with it?

  Laurence Sterne

  Peace, Kings, Men

  'Tristram Shandy' (1759-67) bk. 1, ch. 7

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• Courtship consists in a number of quiet attentions, not so pointed as to alarm, nor so vague as not to be understood.

  Laurence Sterne

  Marriage, Numbers, Alarms

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• We all cry out that the world is corrupt,--and I fear too justly,--but we never reflect, what we have to thank for it, and that itis our open countenance of vice, which gives the lye to our private censures of it, which is its chief protection and encouragement.

  Laurence Sterne

  Encouragement, Giving, Hypocrisy

  Laurence Sterne (1873). “The Works of Laurence Sterne ...: With a Life of the Author”, p.130, London : Bickers, H. Sotheran

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