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nydus/The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, GentlemanPublic

A man describes his birth and upbringing through the adventures of his family.

Page 249 of 810
Table of Contents

The Author’s Preface

your worships and myself⁠—there is but a certain quantum stored up for us all, for the use and behoof of the whole race of mankind; and such small modicums of ’em are only sent forth into this wide world, circulating here and there in one bye corner or another⁠—and in such narrow streams, and at such prodigious intervals from each other, that one would wonder how it holds out, or could be sufficient for the wants and emergencies of so many great estates, and populous empires.

Indeed there is one thing to be considered, that in Nova Zembla , North Lapland , and in all those cold and dreary tracts of the globe, which lie more directly under the arctick and antarctick circles, where the whole province of a man’s concernments lies for near nine months together within the narrow compass of his cave⁠—where the spirits are compressed almost to nothing⁠—and where the passions of a man, with everything which belongs to them, are as frigid as the zone itself⁠—there the least quantity of judgment imaginable does the business⁠—and of wit ⁠⸺⁠there

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