Quotes from Tobias Smollett

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

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.

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.

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.

Opposition is the very spur of love.

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

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

Some folks are wise and some are otherwise.

Nature and wisdom are not, but should be, companions.

Some folks are wise and some are otherwise.

8 June. At London. I am pent up in frowsy lodgings, where there is not room enough to swing a cat.

That great Cham of literature, Samuel Johnson.

He was formed for the ruin of our sex.

Who bravely dares must sometimes risk a fall.

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