The voices / 112 fragments

Laurence Sterne

1713 AD — 1768 AD

Listed in the author section of Bartlett’s ninth-edition anthology, in the linked 1905 printing. Dates reflect that historical edition and may differ from modern scholarship.

Author and source reference ↗

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Historical source references

Tristram Shandy (orig
Sentimental Journey
In the Street
Maria
The Passport
Sermon xvi
Sermon xxvii
Courtship · anthology attribution: Sterne
Fame · anthology attribution: Sterne
Forgiveness · anthology attribution: Sterne
Grumbling · anthology attribution: Sterne
Health · anthology attribution: Sterne
Intemperance · anthology attribution: Sterne
Pride · anthology attribution: Sterne
Scepticism · anthology attribution: Sterne
Sleep · anthology attribution: Sterne
Printed citation: Sterne
Number 425 · printed citation: Sterne
Page 41 · printed citation: Laurence Sterne (Tristram Shandy)
Page 100 · printed citation: Sterne (Tristram Shandy)
Page 283 · printed citation: Sterne (Tristram Shandy)
Page 6 · printed citation: Sterne · subject: Afflictions
Page 47 · printed citation: Sterne · subject: Conscience
Page 107 · printed citation: Sterne · subject: Gravity
Page 254 · printed citation: Sterne · subject: Sympathy
Page 258 · printed citation: Sterne · subject: Teeth

Archive entries

01Undated

Digressions incontestably are the sunshine; they are the life, the soul of reading.

Laurence Sterne / quote

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02Undated

Every time a man smiles, much more when he laughs, it adds something to his fragment of life.

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03Undated

Fancy is capricious; wit must not be searched for, and pleasantry will not come in at a call.

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04Undated

Get on the crupper of a good stout hypothesis, and you may ride round the world.

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05Undated

Gravity is a taught trick to gain credit of the world for more sense and knowledge than a man is worth.

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06Undated

Gravity, with all its pretensions, was no better, but often worse, than what a French wit had long ago defined it, viz., a mysterious carriage of the body to cover the defects of the mind.

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07Undated

Honours, like impressions upon coin, may give an ideal and local value to a bit of base metal; but gold and silver will pass all the world over, without any other recommendation than their own weight.

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08Undated

Impatience is the principal cause of most of our irregularities and extravagances.

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09Undated

In solitude the mind gains strength and learns to lean upon itself.

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10Undated

Keyholes are the occasions of more sin and wickedness than all the other holes in this world put together.

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11Undated

Learning is the dictionary, but sense the grammar, of science.

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12Undated

Lessons of wisdom have never such power over us as when they are wrought into the heart through the groundwork of a story which engages the passions.

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13Undated

Madness is consistent, which is more than can be said for poor reason. Our passions and principles are steady in frenzy, but begin to shift and waver as we return to reason.

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14Undated

Man has seldom an offer of kindness to make to a woman but she has a presentiment of it some moments before.

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15Undated

Man's body and his mind are exactly like a jerkin and a jerkin's lining—rumple the one, you rumple the other.

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16Undated

Mysteries which must explain themselves are not worth the loss of time which a conjecture about them takes up.

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17Undated

Nature never made an unkind creature; ill-usage and bad habits have deformed a fair and lovely creation.

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18Undated

Nothing is so perfectly amusement as a total change of ideas.

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19Undated

Poets should turn philosophers in age, as Pope did. We are apt to grow chilly when we sit out our fire.

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20Undated

Remember this: that your conscience is not a law—no; God and reason made the law, and has placed conscience within you to determine.

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21Undated

Small curses upon great occasions are but so much waste of our strength and soul's health to no manner of purpose; they are like sparrow-shot fired against a bastion.

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22Undated

Smelfungus in the grand portico of the Pantheon says, "'Tis nothing but a huge cockpit."

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23Undated

Some people pass through life soberly and religiously enough, without knowing why, or reasoning about it, but, from force of habit merely, go to heaven like fools.

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24Undated

Sweet pliability of man's spirit, that can at once surrender itself to illusions which cheat expectation and sorrow of their weary moments!

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Laurence Sterne

Archive entries

Read further

Meditations

The Republic

The Prophet