Henry Fielding

"Republic of letters."

"When children are doing nothing, they are doing mischief."

"To speak a bold truth, I am, after much mature deliberation, inclined to suspect that the public voice hath, in all ages, done much injustice to Fortune, and hath convicted her of many facts in which she had not the least concern."

"Life may as properly be called an art as any other."

"It hath been often said, that it is not death, but dying which is terrible."

"Guilt has very quick ears to an accusation."

"When widows exclaim loudly against second marriages, I would always lay a wager that the man, if not the wedding day, is absolutely fixed on."

"One fool at least in every married couple."

"A good face, they say, is a letter of recommendation. O Nature, Nature, why art thou so dishonest, as ever to send men with these false recommendations into the World?"

"There is not in the universe a more ridiculous, nor more contemptible animal, than a proud clergyman."

"Custom may lead a man into many errors; but it justifies none."

"There is no dull chapter. But he makes the hero too good. He seems to think that so long as Tom goes for a little miscellaneous fornication he will be saved from priggishness. I doubt if this is so, especially at the end, where Tom's angelicalness upon the misfortunes of Blifil is really a bit thick."

"The History of a Foundling is truth, and human nature itself; and there lies the inestimable advantage which it possesses over all previous fictions of this particular kind."

"These are called the pious frauds of friendship."

"Jeder Arzt hat seine Lieblingskrankheit."