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My wife, who does not like journalizing, said it was leaving myself embowelled to posterity--a good strong figure. But I think itis rather leaving myself embalmed. It is certainly preserving myself.

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
Wife
Preserving
Rather
Autobiography
Strong
Posterity
Doe
Immortality
Good
Leaving
Think
Figure
Thinking
Figures
Like
Certainly
Embalmed

More quotes by James Boswell

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Many infidels have maintained that Ignorance is the mother of Devotion.
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When a man is familiar with many people he must expect many disagreeable familiarizations.
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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.
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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.
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In every picture there should be shade as well as light.
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After I went to bed I had a curious fancy as to dreams. In sleep the doors of the mind are shut, and thoughts come jumping in at the windows. They tumble headlong, and therefore are so disorderly and strange. Sometimes they are stout and light on their feet, and then they are rational dreams.
James Boswell
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The man who stops making new friends eventually will have none.
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Quotation is more universal and more ancient than one would perhaps believe.
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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.
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Melancholy cannot be clearly proved to others, so it is better to be silent about it.
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My father had declared a predilection for heirs general, that is, males and females indiscriminately.... I, on the other hand, had a zealous partiality for heirs male, however remote.
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I find I journalize too tediously. Let me try to abbreviate.
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Dr Johnson said, the inscription should have been in Latin, as every thing intended to be universal and permanent, should be.
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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.
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That favorite subject, Myself.
James Boswell
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If a man is prodigal, he cannot be truly generous.
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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.
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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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I am so fond of tea that I could write a whole dissertation on its virtues. It comforts and enlivens without the risks attendant on spirituous liquors. Gentle herb! Let the florid grape yield to thee. Thy soft influence is a more safe inspirer of social joy.
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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.
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