Page:The life and opinions of Tristram Shandy (Volume 1).pdf/62

 no better, but often worse, than what a French wit had long ago defined it,—''viz. A mysterious carriage of the body to cover the defects of the mind;—which definition of gravity, Yorick'', with great imprudence, would say, deserved to be wrote in letters of gold.

But, in plain truth, he was a man unhackneyed and unpractised in the world, and was altogether as indiscreet and foolish on every other subject of discourse where policy is wont to impress restraint. Yorick had no impression but one, and that was what arose from the nature of the deed spoken of; which impression he would usually translate into plain English without any periphrasis;—and too oft without much distinction of either personage, time, or place;—so that when mention was made of a pitiful or an