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[A]s a lady adjusts her dress before a mirror, a man adjusts his character by looking at his journal.

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
Men
Journal
Lady
Mirror
Dress
Dresses
Mirrors
Looking
Adjusts
Character
Autobiography

More quotes by James Boswell

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The scent of Sloth tempts a smug man.
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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But what can a man see of a library being one day in it?
James Boswell
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When we know exactly all a man's views and how he comes to speak and act so and so, we lose any respect for him, though we may love and admire him.
James Boswell
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The man who stops making new friends eventually will have none.
James Boswell
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Many infidels have maintained that Ignorance is the mother of Devotion.
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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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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He had no settled plan of life, nor looked forward at all, but merely lived from day to day. Yet he read a great deal in a desultory manner, without any scheme of study, as chance threw books in his way, and inclination directed him through them.
James Boswell
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I fancy mankind may come, in time, to write all aphoristically.
James Boswell
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No, Sir, claret is the liquor for boys port for men: but he who aspires to be a hero must drink brandy. In the first place brandy will do soonest for a man what drinking can do for him.
James Boswell
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That favorite subject, Myself.
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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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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Have a sense of piety ever on your mind, and be ever mindful that this is subject to no change, but will last you as long as life and support you in death. Elevate your soul by prayer and by contemplation without mystical enthusiasm.
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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I argued that the chastity of women was of much more consequence than that of men, as the property and rights of families depend upon 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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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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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