Laurence Sterne Quotes
Top 100 wise famous quotes and sayings by Laurence Sterne
Laurence Sterne Famous Quotes & Sayings
Discover top inspirational quotes from Laurence Sterne on Wise Famous Quotes.
Religion which lays so many restraints upon us, is a troublesome companion to those who will lay no restraints upon themselves.
I am positive I have a soul; nor can all the books with which materialists have pestered the world ever convince me to the contrary.
I have a strong propensity in me to begin this chapter very nonsensically, and I will not balk my fancy.
Accordingly I set off thus:
Accordingly I set off thus:
People who overly take care of their health are like misers. They hoard up a treasure which they never enjoy.
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.
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!
When a man is discontented with himself, it has one advantage - that it puts him into an excellent frame of mind for making a bargain.
And what of this new book the whole world makes such a rout about?
Oh ! 'tis out of all plumb, my lord,
quite an irregular thing!
Oh ! 'tis out of all plumb, my lord,
quite an irregular thing!
Positiveness is a most absurd foible. If you are in the right, it lessens your triumph; if in the wrong, it adds shame to your defeat.
Shall we for ever make new books, as apothecaries make new mixtures, by pouring only out of one vessel into another?
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!
woe be to truth!
There is one sweet lenitive at least for evils, which nature holds out; so I took it kindly at her hands, and fell asleep.
Whatever stress some may lay upon it, a death-bed repentance is but a weak and slender plank to trust our all on.
Keyholes are the occasions of more sin and wickedness, than all other holes in this world put together.
My father, whose way was to force every event in nature into an hypothesis, by which means never man crucified TRUTH at the rate he did.
Before an affliction is digested, consolation ever comes too soon; and after it is digested, it comes too late.
Titles of honor are like the impressions on coins, which add no value to gold or silver, but only render brass current.
Our passion and principals are constantly in a frenzy, but begin to shift and waver, as we return to reason.
To write a book is for all the world like humming a song - be but in tune with yourself, madam, 'tis no matter how high or how low you take it.
There is not a greater paradox in nature,
than that so good a religion [as Christianity] should be no better recommended by its professors.
than that so good a religion [as Christianity] should be no better recommended by its professors.
The most affluent may be stripped of all, and find his worldly comforts, like so many withered leaves, dropping from him.
Go, poor devil, get thee gone! Why should I hurt thee? This world surely is wide enough to hold both thee and me.
Every thing in this world, said my father, is big with jest,
and has wit in it, and instruction too,
if we can but find it out.
and has wit in it, and instruction too,
if we can but find it out.
Only the brave know how to forgive; it is the most refined and generous pitch of virtue human nature can arrive at.
It had ever, as I told the reader, been one of the singular blessings of my life, to be almost every hour of it miserably in love with some one ...
What a large volume of adventures may be grasped within the span of his little life by him who interests his heart in everything.
The more tickets you have in a lottery, the worse your chance. And it is the same of virtues, in the lottery of life.
If a man has a right to be proud of anything, it is of a good action done as it ought to be, without any base interest lurking at the bottom of it.
A dwarf who brings a standard along with him to measure his own size, take my word, is a dwarf in more articles than one.
Any one may do a casual act of good-nature; but a continuation of them shows it a part of the temperament.
One may as well be asleep as to read for anything but to improve his mind and morals, and regulate his conduct.
Courtship consists in a number of quiet attentions, not so pointed as to alarm, nor so vague as not to be understood.
We are born to trouble; and we may depend upon it, whilst we live in this world, we shall have it, though with intermissions.
Writing, when properly managed, (as you may be sure I think mine is) is but a different name for conversation.
ever woman, since the creation of the world, interrupt a man with such a silly question? Pray, what was your father saying? - Nothing.
People who are always taking care of their health are like misers, who are hoarding a treasure which they have never spirit enough to enjoy.