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Freethinkers are generally those who never think at all.

Laurence Sterne

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Laurence Sterne
Age: 54 †
Born: 1713
Born: November 24
Died: 1768
Died: March 18
Autobiographer
Novelist
Religious
Writer
Think
Thinking
Freethinkers
Freethinker
Infidelity
Generally
Never

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I hate set dissertations,--and above all things in the world, 'tis one of the silliest things in one of them, to darken your hypothesis by placing a number of tall, opake words, one before another, in a right line, betwixt your own and your readers conception.
Laurence Sterne
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The circumstances with which every thing in this world is begirt, give every thing in this world its size and shape--and by tightening it, or relaxing it, this way or that, make the thing to be, what it is--great--little--good--bad--indifferent or not indifferent, just as the case happens.
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It is sweet to feel by what fine spun threads our affections are drawn together.
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Lessons of wisdom have the most power over us when they capture the heart through the groundwork of a story, which engages the passions.
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O blessed Health! thou art above all gold and treasure 'tis thou who enlargest the soul, and openest all its powers to receive instruction, and to relish virtue. He that has thee has little more to wish for, and he that is so wretched as to want thee, wants everything with thee.
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'Tis known by the name of perseverance in a good cause,-and of obstinacy in a bad one.
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Philosophy has a fine saying for everything.-For Death it has an entire set.
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The best friends in the world may differ sometimes.
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When the affections so kindly break loose, Joy, is another name for Religion.
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What is the life of man! Is it not to shift from side to side? From sorrow to sorrow? To button up one cause of vexation! And unbutton another!
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Of all duties, prayer certainly is the sweetest and most easy.
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...beauty, like truth, never is so glorious as when it goes the plainest.
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The world is ashamed of being virtuous.
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For every ten jokes you acquire a hundred enemies.
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There is no such thing as real happiness in life. The justest definition that was ever given of it was a tranquil acquiescence under an agreeable delusion--I forget where.
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When the heart flies out before the understanding, it saves the judgment a world of pains.
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There is no small degree of malicious craft in fixing upon a season to give a mark of enmity and ill-will: a word--a look, which at one time would make no impression, at another time wounds the heart, and, like a shaft flying with the wind, pierces deep, which, with its own natural force, would scarce have reached the object aimed at.
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There is not a greater paradox in nature,--than that so good a religion [as Christianity] should be no better recommended by its professors.
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In solitude the mind gains strength, and learns to lean upon herself in the world it seeks or accepts of a few treacherous supports--the feigned compassion of one, the flattery of a second, the civilities of a third, the friendship of a fourth--they all deceive, and bring the mind back to retirement, reflection, and books.
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Writing, when properly managed, (as you may be sure I think mine is) is but a different name for conversation.
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