Laurence Sterne Quotes

Shall we be destined to the days of eternity, on holy-days, as well as working-days, to be showing the relics of learning, as monks do the relics of their saints — without working one — one single miracle with them?

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

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.

What could Dr. Slop do? — he crossed himself + — Pugh! — but the doctor, Sir, was a Papist. — No matter; he had better have kept hold of the pummel. — He had so; — nay, as it happened, he had better have done nothing at all; for in crossing himself he let go his whip, — and in attempting to save his whip betwixt his knee and his saddle’s skirt, as it slipped, he lost his stirrup, — in losing which he lost his seat; — and in the multitude of all these losses (which, by the bye, shews what little advantage there is in crossing) the unfortunate doctor lost his presence of mind. So that without waiting for Obadiah’s onset, he left his pony to its destiny, tumbling off it diagonally, something in the stile and manner of a pack of wool, and without any other consequence from the fall, save that of being left (as it would have been) with the broadest part of him sunk about twelve inches deep in the mire.

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:

A white bear! Very well. Have I ever seen one? Might I ever have seen one? Am I ever to have seen one?
Ought I ever to have seen one? Or can I ever see one?

Would I have seen a white bear! (for how can I imagine it?)

If I should see a white bear, what should I say?
If I should never see a white bear, what then?

If I never have, can, must, or shall see a white bear alive; have I ever seen the skin of one?
Did I ever see one painted? -Described?

Have I never dreamed of one?

Did my father, mother, uncle, aunt, brothers or sisters, ever see a white bear?
What would they give?
How would they behave?
How would the white bear have behaved?

Is he wild? Tame? Terrible? Rough? Smooth?

- Is the white bear worth seeing? -

- Is there no sin in it? -

Is it better than a Black One?

Every time a man smiles,—but much more so, when he laughs, that it adds something to this Fragment of life.

— This is vile work. — For which reason, from the beginning of this, you see, I have constructed the main work and the adventitious parts of it with such intersections, and have so complicated and involved the digressive and progressive movements, one wheel within another, that the whole machine, in general, has been kept a-going; — and, what’s more, it shall be kept a-going these forty years, if it pleases the fountain of health to bless me so long with life and good spirits.

I am this month one whole year older than I was this time twelve-month; and having got, as you perceive, almost into the middle of my fourth volume — and no farther than to my first day's life — 'tis demonstrative that I have three hundred and sixty-four days more life to write just now, than when I first set out; so that instead of advancing, as a common writer, in my work with what I have been doing at it — on the contrary, I am just thrown so many volumes back —

Delicious essence! how refreshing art thou to Nature! how strongly are all its powers and all its weaknesses on thy side! how sweetly dost thou mix with the blood, and help it through the most difficult and tortuous passages to the heart!

So that whether the pain of a wound in the groin (cæteris paribus) is greater than the pain of a wound in the knee — or
Whether the pain of a wound in the knee is not greater than the pain of a wound in the groin — are points which to this day remain unsettled.

Now don't let us give ourselves a parcel of airs, and pretend that the oaths we make free with in this land of liberty of ours are our own; and because we have the spirit to swear them, — imagine that we have had the wit to invent them too.

Tis a long journey, Sir, replied the master of the inn — — unless a man has great business. — — Tut! tut! said the stranger, I have been at the promontory of Noses; and have got me one of the goodliest, thank Heaven, that ever fell to a single man’s lot.

Whilst the stranger was giving this odd account of himself, the master of the inn and his wife kept both their eyes fixed full upon the stranger’s nose — — By saint Radagunda, said the inn-keeper’s wife to herself, there is more of it than in any dozen of the largest noses put together in all Strasburg! is it not, said she, whispering her husband in his ear, is it not a noble nose?

’Tis an imposture, my dear,' said the master of the inn — — ’tis a false nose.'
’Tis a true nose,' said his wife.
’Tis made of fir-tree,' said he, I smell the turpentine. — —
'There’s a pimple on it,' said she.
’Tis a dead nose,' replied the inn-keeper.
’Tis a live nose, if I am alive myself,' said the inn-keeper’s wife.

The stranger had not got half a league on his way towards Frankfort before were just ringing to call the Strasburgers to their devotions, and shut up the duties of the day in prayer: — no soul in all Strasburg heard ’em — the city was like a swarm of bees — — men, women, and children, (the Compline bells tinkling all the time) flying here and there — in at one door, out at another — — this way and that way — long ways and cross ways — up one street, down another street — — in at this alley, out of that — — did you see it? did you see it? did you see it? O! did you see it? — — who saw it? who did see it? for mercy’s sake, who saw it?

Alack o’day! I was at vespers! — I was washing, I was starching, I was scouring, I was quilting — — God help me! I never saw it — — I never touch’d it! — — would I had been a centinel, a bandy-legg’d drummer, a trumpeter, a trumpeter’s wife, was the general cry and lamentation in every street and corner of Strasburg.

No man cares to have his virtues the sport of contingencies—or one man may be generous, as another is puissant;—sed non quoad hanc—or be it as it may,—for there is no regular reasoning upon the ebbs and flows of our humours; they may depend upon the same causes, for aught I know, which influence the tides themselves: ’twould oft be no discredit to us, to suppose it was so: I’m sure at least for myself, that in many a case I should be more highly satisfied, to have it said by the world, “I had had an affair with the moon, in which there was neither sin nor shame,” than have it pass altogether as my own act and deed, wherein there was so much of both.

Our armies swore terribly in Flanders, cried my uncle Toby, — but nothing to this. — For my own part, I could not have a heart to curse my dog so.