"What a cursed lyar! for I am sick as a horse, quoth I, already--what a brain!--upside down!--hey dey! the cells are broke loose one into another, and the blood, and the lymph, and the nervous juices, with the fix'd and volatile salts, are all jumbled into one mass--good g---! every thing turns round in it like a thousand whirlpools"

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)


Date
1760-7
Metaphor
"What a cursed lyar! for I am sick as a horse, quoth I, already--what a brain!--upside down!--hey dey! the cells are broke loose one into another, and the blood, and the lymph, and the nervous juices, with the fix'd and volatile salts, are all jumbled into one mass--good g---! every thing turns round in it like a thousand whirlpools"
Metaphor in Context
Why, there is not time for a man to be sick in it, replied he--What a cursed lyar! for I am sick as a horse, quoth I, already--what a brain!--upside down!--hey dey! the cells are broke loose one into another, and the blood, and the lymph, and the nervous juices, with the fix'd and volatile salts, are all jumbled into one mass--good g---! every thing turns round in it like a thousand whirlpools --I'd give a shilling to know if I shan't write the clearer for it--
(VII.ii, pp. 8)
Provenance
Searching "cell" and "brain" in HDIS (Prose)
Citation
At least 82 entries in ESTC (1759, 1760, 1761, 1762, 1763, 1765, 1767, 1768, 1769, 1770, 1771, 1772, 1773, 1774, 1775, 1776, 1777, 1779, 1780, 1781, 1782, 1783, 1786, 1788, 1791, 1792, 1793, 1794, 1795, 1796, 1798, 1799, 1800). Complicated publication history: vols. 1 and 2 published in London January 1, 1760. Vols. 3, 4, 5, and 6 published in 1761. Vols. 7 and 8 published in 1765. Vol. 9 published in 1767.

See Laurence Sterne, The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman, 9 vols. (London: Printed for D. Lynch, 1760-1767). <Link to ECCO><Link to 1759 York edition in ECCO>

First two volumes available in ECCO-TCP: <Vol. 1><Vol. 2>. Most text drawn from second (London) edition <Link to LION>.

For vols. 3-4, see ESTC T14705 <R. and J. Dodsley, 1761>. For vols. 5-6, see ESTC T14706 <T. Becket and P. A. Dehondt, 1762>. For vols. 7-8, see ESTC T14820 <T. Becket and P. A. Dehont, 1765>. For vol. 9, <T. Becket and P. A. Dehondt, 1767>.

Reading in Laurence Sterne, Tristram Shandy: An Authoritative Text, Backgrounds and Sources, Criticism, Ed. Howard Anderson (New York: Norton, 1980).
Date of Entry
08/29/2005
Date of Review
10/07/2008

The Mind is a Metaphor is authored by Brad Pasanek, Assistant Professor of English, University of Virginia.