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I fancy mankind may come, in time, to write all aphoristically.

James Boswell

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James Boswell
Age: 54 †
Born: 1740
Born: October 18
Died: 1795
Died: May 19
Biographer
Diarist
Lawyer
Writer
Edinburgh
Scotland
James Boswell I
James
I Boswell
Mankind
Write
May
Come
Writing
Time
Fancy

More quotes by James Boswell

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Dr. Johnson ... sometimes employed himself in chymistry, sometimes in watering and pruning a vine, and sometimes in small experiments, at which those who may smile, should recollect that there are moments which admit of being soothed only by trifles.
James Boswell
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I am sensible that my keenness of temper, and a vanity to be distinguished for the day, make me too often splash in life.... I amresolved to restrain myself and attend more to decorum.
James Boswell
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We must take our friends as they are.
James Boswell
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In every picture there should be shade as well as light.
James Boswell
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But what can a man see of a library being one day in it?
James Boswell
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For my own part I think no innocent species of wit or pleasantry should be suppressed: and that a good pun may be admitted among the smaller excellencies of lively conversation.
James Boswell
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In an orchard there should be enough to eat, enough to lay up, enough to be stolen, and enough to rot on the ground.
James Boswell
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My curiosity to see the melancholy spectacle of the executions was so strong that I could not resist it, although I was sensible that I would suffer much from it.... I got upon a scaffold near the fatal tree so that I could clearly see all the dismal scene.... I was most terribly shocked, and thrown into a very deep melancholy.
James Boswell
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Melancholy cannot be clearly proved to others, so it is better to be silent about it.
James Boswell
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My mind was, as it were, strongly impregnated with the Johnsonian ether.
James Boswell
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If a man who is born to a fortune cannot make himself easier and freer than those who are not, he gains nothing.
James Boswell
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Quotation is more universal and more ancient than one would perhaps believe.
James Boswell
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Those who would extirpate evil from the world know little of human nature. As well might punch be palatable without souring as existence agreeable without care.
James Boswell
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The man who stops making new friends eventually will have none.
James Boswell
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I have seen many a bear led by a man: but I never before saw a man led by a bear.
James Boswell
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A Sceptick therefore, who because he finds that Truths are not universally received, doubts of their existence, is just as foolish as a man who should try large shoes upon little feet, and little shoes upon large feet, and finding that they did not fit.
James Boswell
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If a man is prodigal, he cannot be truly generous.
James Boswell
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What a curious creature is man with what a variety of powers and faculties is he endued yet how easily is he disturbed and put out of order.
James Boswell
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The scent of Sloth tempts a smug man.
James Boswell
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As all who come into the country must obey the King, so all who come into an university must be of the Church.
James Boswell