Tobias Smollett famous quotes

03-28-2025

Some folks are wise and some are otherwise.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Wise #Sarcastic #Folks
Nature and wisdom are not, but should be, companions.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Nature #Companion
There is not room to swing a cat.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Cat
True courage scorns to vent her prowess in a storm of words; and to the valiant action speaks alone.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Storm #Action #Speak
Nature I'll court in her sequester'd haunts, By mountain, meadow, streamlet, grove, or cell; Where the pois'd lark his evening ditty chants, And health, and peace, and contemplation dwell.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Country #Mountain #Contemplation
False as the fowler's artful snare.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Falsehood
To the valiant actions speak alone.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Action #Speak
A man's opinion of danger varies at different times, in consequence of an irregular tide of animal spirits; and he is actuated by considerations which he dares not avow.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Animal #Different #Opinion
Ridiculous modes, invented by ignorance, and adopted by folly.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Ignorance #Ridiculous #Adopted
Deep in the frozen regions of the north, A goddess violated brought thee forth, Immortal Liberty!
-- Tobias Smollett

#Liberty #Goddess #Immortal
The great Cham of literature. (Samuel Johnson)
-- Tobias Smollett

#Literature
The Highlanders regale themselves with whisky. They find it an excellent preservation against the winter cold. It is given with great success to the infants in the confluent smallpox.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Winter #Cold #Highlander
Of this diversion the Scots are so fond, that, when the weather will permit, you may see a multitude of all ranks, from the senator of justice to the lowest tradesman, mingled together, in their shirts, and following the balls with utmost eagerness.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Golf #Weather #Justice
Every shot has its commission, d'ye see? We must all die at one time, as the saying is.
-- Tobias Smollett

#War #Shots
On Leven's banks, while free to rove, And tune the rural pipe to love, I envied not the happiest swain That ever trod the Arcadian plain. Pure stream! in whose transparent wave My youthful limbs I wont to lave; No torrents stain thy limpid source, No rocks impede thy dimpling course, That sweetly warbles o'er its bed, With white, round, polish'd pebbles spread.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Rocks #White #Pebbles
Number three is always fortunate.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Numbers #Three
Thy fatal shafts unerring move; I bow before thine altar, Love!
-- Tobias Smollett

#Life #Moving #Love Life
A mere index hunter, who held the eel of science by the tail.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Science #Eels #Hunters
Who bravely dares must sometimes risk a fall.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Courage #Fall #Risk
Glory is the child of peril.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Children #Glory #Peril
I find that the old Roman baths of this quarter, were found covered by an old burying ground, belonging to the Abbey; through which, in all probability, the water drains in its passage; so that as we drink the decoction of the living bodies at the Pump-room, we swallow the strainings of rotten bones and carcasses at the private bath - I vow to God, the very idea turns my stomach!
-- Tobias Smollett

#Ideas #Water #Rotten
I think for my part one half of the nation is mad - and the other not very sound.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Thinking #Mad #Half
A mere index hunter, who held the eel of science by the tail. Index-hunter is a term used mockingly, meaning one who acquires superficial knowledge merely by consulting indexes. The '[holding] the eel of science by the tail' allusion was used in 1728 by Alexander Pope (q.v.).
-- Tobias Smollett

#Learning #Science #Eels
Opposition is the very spur of love.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Spurs
And hearts resolved and hands prepared The blessings they enjoy to guard.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Heart #Blessing #Hands
One wit, like a knuckle of ham in soup, gives a zest and flavour to the dish, but more than one serves only to spoil the pottage.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Zest #Giving #Ham
Thy spirit, Independence, let me share! Lord of the lion-heart and eagle-eye thy steps I follow with my bosom bare, nor heed the storm that howls along the sky.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Eye #Heart #Eagles
Writing is all a lottery -- I have been a loser by the works of the greatest men of the age.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Writing #Men #Age
The capital is become an overgrown monster; which, like a dropsical head, will in time leave the body and extremities without nourishment and support.
-- Tobias Smollett

#Time #Support #Body

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