Only the brave know how to forgive; it is the most refined and generous pitch of virtue human nature can arrive at.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Forgiveness
Rest unto our souls!—’tis all we want—the end of all our wishes and pursuits: we seek for it in titles, in riches and pleasures—climb up after it by ambition,—come down again and stoop for it by avarice,—try all extremes; nor is it till after many miserable experiments, that we are convinced, at last, we have been seeking everywhere for it but where there is a prospect of finding it; and that is, within ourselves, in a meek and lowly disposition of heart.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Rest
Inward sincerity will of course influence the outward deportment; where the one is wanting, there is great reason to suspect the absence of the other.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Sincerity
An injury unanswered, in time grows weary of itself and dies away in voluntary remorse. In bad dispositions, capable of no restraint but fear, it has a different effect; the silent digestion of one wrong provokes a second.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Injury
To have a respect for ourselves guides our morals; and to have a deference for others governs our manners.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Respect, Manners, Morals, Self-respect, Respectability
Learning is the dictionary, but sense the grammar of science.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Science
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.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Kindness
There are worse occupations in this world than feeling a woman’s pulse.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Medicine, Doctors
The most affluent may be stripped of all, and find his worldly comforts, like so many withered leaves, dropping from him.
—Laurence Sterne
Nothing in this life, after health and virtue, is more estimable than knowledge,—nor is there anything so easily attained, or so cheaply purchased,—the labor, only sitting still, and the expense but time, which, if we do not spend, we cannot save.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Knowledge
‘Tis known by the name of perseverance in a good cause, and of obstinacy in a bad one.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Perseverance
People who are always taking care of their health are like misers, who are hoarding up a treasure which they have never spirit enough to enjoy.
—Laurence Sterne
Beauty hath so many charms one knows not how to speak against it; and when a graceful figure is the habitation of a virtuous soul—when the beauty of the face speaks out the modesty and humility of the mind, it raises our thoughts up to the great Creator; but after all, beauty, like truth, is never so glorious as when it goes the plainest.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Beauty
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!
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Hypocrisy, Criticism, Art, Critics
Fishwomen cry noble oysters. They certainly are full as noble as any family blazoned out in Collin’s peerage. If not of as ancient an house, of as old a bed at least. And to show their richness too, pearls and they are congenial.
—Laurence Sterne
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.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Jokes
Before an affliction is digested, consolation comes too soon; and after it is digested, it comes too late; but there is a mark between these two, as fine almost as a hair, for a comforter to take aim at.
—Laurence Sterne
Now or never was the time.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: The Present, Secrets of Success
God tempers the wind to the shorn lamb.
—Laurence Sterne
It is almost impossible for any one who reads much, and reflects a, good deal, to be able, on every occasion, to determine whether a thought was another’s or his own.—I have several times quoted sentences out of my own writings, in aid of my own arguments, in conversation, thinking that I was supporting them by some better authority.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Originality
Writing, when properly managed, is but a different name for conversation.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Writing
Lessons of wisdom have the most power over us when they capture the heart through the groundwork of a story, which engages the passions.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Teachers, Teaching
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.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Certainty, Happiness
When ever a person talks loudly against religion, always suspect that it is not their reason, but their passions, which have got the better of their beliefs. A bad life and a good belief are disagreeable and troublesome neighbors; and when they separate, depend on it that it is for the sake of peace and quiet.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Atheism
If the principles of contentment are not within us, the height of station and worldly grandeur will as soon add a cubit to a man’s stature as to his happiness.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Contentment, Happiness
Titles of honor are like the impressions on coin, which add no value to gold and silver, but only render brass current.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Honor, Titles
The way to fame is like the way to heaven, through much tribulation.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Fame
The mind should be accustomed to make wise reflections, and draw curious conclusions as it goes along; the habit of which made Pliny the Younger affirm that he never read a book so bad but he drew some profit from it.
—Laurence Sterne
Topics: Reading
Algebra is the metaphysics of arithmetic.
—Laurence Sterne
How large a portion of chastity is sent out of the world by distant hints,—nodded away and cruelly winked into suspicion, by the envy of those who are past all temptation of it themselves. How often does the reputation of a helpless creature bleed by a report which the party propagating it beholds with pity, and is sorry for it, and hopes it may not be true, but in the meantime gives it her pass, that at least it may have fair play in the world,—to be believed or not, according to the charity of those into whose hands it shall happen to fall.
—Laurence Sterne
Wondering Whom to Read Next?
- Richard Chenevix Trench Irish Archbishop, Poet
- Jonathan Swift Irish Satirist
- Elizabeth Bowen Irish Novelist
- Sheridan Le Fanu Irish Novelist
- Joyce Cary English Novelist
- James Joyce Irish Novelist
- Samuel Lover Irish Writer, Artist, Songwriter
- Charles Lutwidge Dodgson (Lewis Carroll) British Anglican Author
- Marguerite Gardiner, Countess of Blessington Irish Novelist
- Oliver Goldsmith Anglo-Irish Novelist, Poet
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