Date: 1768

"But 'tis a civil thing, said I--and as I generally act from the first impulse, and therefore seldom listen to these cabals, which serve no purpose, that I know of, but to encompass the heart with adamant--I turn'd instantly about to the lady."

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1768

"I should as soon think of making a genteel suit of cloaths out of remnants:--and to do it--pop--at first sight by declaration--is submitting the offer and themselves with it, to be sifted, with all their pours and contres, by an unheated mind."

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1768

"In saying this, I was making not so much La Fleur's eloge, as my own, having been in love with one princess or another almost all my life, and I hope I shall go on so, till I die, being firmly persuaded, that if ever I do a mean action, it must be in some interval betwixt one passion and another...

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1768

"The fire caught--and the whole city, like the heart of one man, open'd itself to Love."

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1768

"No doubt the ocean fills the mind with vast ideas."

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1768

"With reason, said I; for if it is a good one, 'tis pity it should be stolen: 'tis a little treasure to thee, and gives a better air to your face, than if it was dress'd out with pearls."

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1768

"I had left London with so much precipitation, that it never enter'd my mind that we were at war with France; and had reach'd Dover, and look'd through my glass at the hills beyond Boulogne, before the idea presented itself; and with this in its train, that there was no getting there without a pa...

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1768

"The mind sits terrified at the objects she has magnified herself and blackened; reduce them to their proper size and hue she overlooks them."

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1768

"I vow, I never had my affections more tenderly awakened; or do I remember an incident in my life, where the dissipated spirits, to which my reason had been a bubble, were so suddenly call'd home."

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)

Date: 1768

"I beheld his body half wasted away with long expectation and confinement, and felt what kind of sickness of the heart it was which arises from hope deferr'd."

— Sterne, Laurence (1713-1768)