Tobias Smollett Quotes & Sayings

Thy spirit, Independence, let me share! Lord of the lion-heart and eagle-eye thy steps I follow with my bosom bare, nor heed the storm that howls along the sky. — Tobias Smollett

There is not room to swing a cat. — Tobias Smollett

Writing is all a lottery
I have been a loser by the works of the greatest men of the age. — Tobias Smollett

Some folks are wise and some are otherwise. — Tobias Smollett

A mere index hunter, who held the eel of science by the tail. — Tobias Smollett

truth is, I look upon both candidates in the same light; and should think myself a traitor to the constitution of my country, if I voted for either. If every elector would bring the same consideration home to his conscience, we should not have such reason to exclaim against the venality of pts.5 But we are all a pack of venal and corrupted rascals; so lost to all sense of honesty, and all tenderness of character, that, in a little time, I am fully persuaded, nothing will be infamous but virtue and public-spirit. — Tobias Smollett

On Leven's banks, while free to rove, And tune the rural pipe to love, I envied not the happiest swain That ever trod the Arcadian plain. Pure stream! in whose transparent wave My youthful limbs I wont to lave; No torrents stain thy limpid source, No rocks impede thy dimpling course, That sweetly warbles o'er its bed, With white, round, polish'd pebbles spread. — Tobias Smollett

The great Cham of literature. (Samuel Johnson) — Tobias Smollett

As for the liberty of the press, like every other privilege, it must be restrained within certain bounds; for if it is carried to a breach of law, religion, and charity, it becomes one of the greatest evils that ever annoyed the community. If the lowest ruffian may stab your good-name with impunity in England, will you be so uncandid as to exclaim against Italy for the practice of common assassination? To what purpose is our property secured, if our moral character is left defenceless? People — Tobias Smollett

We have many obligations to this good lady, who is a kind neighbour, an obliging friend, and a most agreeable companion: she speaks English prettily, and is greatly attached to the people and the customs of our nation. They — Tobias Smollett

At every place where we halted, did she mount the stage, and flourished her rusty arms, without being able to make one conquest. — Tobias Smollett

I find that the old Roman baths of this quarter, were found covered by an old burying ground, belonging to the Abbey; through which, in all probability, the water drains in its passage; so that as we drink the decoction of the living bodies at the Pump-room, we swallow the strainings of rotten bones and carcasses at the private bath - I vow to God, the very idea turns my stomach! — Tobias Smollett

Not that there is any thing disagreeable about his person, but there is a total want of that nameless charm which captivates and controuls the inchanted spirit - at least, he appears to me to have this defect; but if he had all the engaging qualifications which a man can possess, they would be excited in vain against that constancy, which, I flatter myself, is the characteristic of my nature. No, — Tobias Smollett

There is such malice, treachery, and dissimulation, even among professed friends and intimate companions, as cannot fail to strike a virtuous mind with horror; and when Vice quits the stage for a moment, her place is immediately occupied by Folly... — Tobias Smollett

Ridiculous modes, invented by ignorance, and adopted by folly. — Tobias Smollett

Of this diversion the Scots are so fond, that, when the weather will permit, you may see a multitude of all ranks, from the senator of justice to the lowest tradesman, mingled together, in their shirts, and following the balls with utmost eagerness. — Tobias Smollett

Glory is the child of peril. — Tobias Smollett

Deep in the frozen regions of the north,
A goddess violated brought thee forth,
Immortal Liberty! — Tobias Smollett

Opposition is the very spur of love. — Tobias Smollett

The bread I eat in London, is a deleterious paste, mixed up with chalk, alum, and bone ashes: insipid to the taste, and destructive to the constitution. — Tobias Smollett

True courage scorns to vent her prowess in a storm of words; and to the valiant action speaks alone. — Tobias Smollett

Thy fatal shafts unerring move;
I bow before thine altar, Love! — Tobias Smollett

Number three is always fortunate. — Tobias Smollett

False as the fowler's artful snare. — Tobias Smollett

There is another point, which I would much rather see determined; whether the world was always as contemptible, as it appears to me at present? - If the morals of mankind have not contracted an extraordinary degree of depravity, within these thirty years, then must I be infected with the common vice of old men, difficilis, querulus, laudator temporis acti;14 or, which is more probable, the impetuous pursuits and avocations of youth have formerly hindered me from observing those rotten parts of human nature, which now appear so offensively to my observation. — Tobias Smollett

To the valiant actions speak alone. — Tobias Smollett

I think for my part one half of the nation is mad - and the other not very sound. — Tobias Smollett

For the first time, Smollett adopted a device that Barbara Foley calls "pseudofactual imposture," a strategy of presentation that we associate with the fictions of Behn, Defoe, and Richardson. — Tobias Smollett

A novel is a large diffused picture, comprehending the characters of life, disposed in different groups, and exhibited in various attitudes, for the purposes of an uniform plan, and general occurrence, to which every individual figure is subservient. But this plan cannot be executed with propriety, probability, or success, without a principal personage to attract the attention, unite the incidents, unwind the clue of the labyrinth, and at last close the scene, by virtue of his own importance. — Tobias Smollett

Who bravely dares must sometimes risk a fall. — Tobias Smollett

And hearts resolved and hands prepared The blessings they enjoy to guard. — Tobias Smollett

Then humming thrice, he assumed a most ridiculous solemnity of aspect, and entered into a learned investigation of the nature of stink...The French were pleased with the putrid effluvia of animal food; and so were the Hottentots in Africa, and the Savages in Greenland; and that the Negroes on the coast of Senegal would not touch fish till it was rotten; strong presumptions in favour of what is generally called stink, as those nations are in a state of nature, undebauched by luxury, unseduced by whim and caprice: that he had reason to believe the stercoraceous flavour, condemned by prejudice as a stink, was, in fact, most agreeable to the organs of smelling; for, that every person who pretended to nauseate the smell of another's excretions, snuffed up his own with particular complacency... — Tobias Smollett

The Highlanders regale themselves with whisky. They find it an excellent preservation against the winter cold. It is given with great success to the infants in the confluent smallpox. — Tobias Smollett

that report has influenced my opinion of his looksYou know we are the fools of prejudice. Howsoever — Tobias Smollett

Every shot has its commission, d'ye see? We must all die at one time, as the saying is. — Tobias Smollett

Nature and wisdom are not, but should be, companions. — Tobias Smollett

Some men are wise and some are otherwise. — Tobias Smollett

The capital is become an overgrown monster; which like a dropsical head, will in time leave the body and extremities without nourishment and support. — Tobias Smollett

A man's opinion of danger varies at different times, in consequence of an irregular tide of animal spirits; and he is actuated by considerations which he dares not avow. — Tobias Smollett

What passes for wine among us, is not the juice of the grape. It is an adulterous mixture, brewed up of nauseous ingredients, by dunces, who are bunglers in the art of poison-making; and yet we, and our forefathers, are and have been poisoned by this cursed drench, without taste or flavour - The only genuine and wholesome beveridge in England, is London porter, and Dorchester table-beer; but as for your ale and your gin, your cyder and your perry, and all the trashy family of made wines, I detest them as infernal compositions, contrived for the destruction of the human species. — Tobias Smollett

Nature I'll court in her sequester'd haunts,
By mountain, meadow, streamlet, grove, or cell;
Where the pois'd lark his evening ditty chants,
And health, and peace, and contemplation dwell. — Tobias Smollett

One wit, like a knuckle of ham in soup, gives a zest and flavour to the dish, but more than one serves only to spoil the pottage. — Tobias Smollett

I can't help suspecting, that there is, or may be some regurgitation from the bath into the cistern of the pump. In that case, what a felicate beveridge is quaffed by the drinkers; medicated with the sweat and the dirt, and dandriff; and the abominable of various kinds, from twenty different diseased bodies, parboiling in the kettle below. — Tobias Smollett