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I went to my father's at night. He spoke of poor John [Boswell's brother] with disgust. I was shocked and said, He's your son, and God made him. He answered very harshly, If my sons are idiots, can I help it?

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
Poor
Shocked
Help
Spoke
Boswell
Father
Disgusting
Harshly
Helping
Idiot
Disgust
Night
John
Idiots
Made
Son
Answered
Brother
Sons
Went
Spokes

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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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[A]s a lady adjusts her dress before a mirror, a man adjusts his character by looking at his journal.
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Many infidels have maintained that Ignorance is the mother of Devotion.
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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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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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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.
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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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I have seen many a bear led by a man: but I never before saw a man led by a bear.
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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.
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Melancholy cannot be clearly proved to others, so it is better to be silent about it.
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It is wonderful that five thousand years have now elapsed since the creation of the world, and still it is undecided whether or not there has ever been an instance of the spirit of any person appearing after death. All argument is against it but all belief is for it.
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That favorite subject, Myself.
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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.
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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.
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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.
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My mind was, as it were, strongly impregnated with the Johnsonian ether.
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A woman's preaching is like a dog's walking on his hinter legs. It is not done well but you are surprised to see it done at all.
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The man who stops making new friends eventually will have none.
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We must take our friends as they are.
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I fancy mankind may come, in time, to write all aphoristically.
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