Page:The life and opinions of Tristram Shandy (Volume 3).pdf/112

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[106]

it would be ten times better without any knobb at all.

Now these two knobs—or top ornaments of the mind of man, which crown the whole entablature,—being, as I said, wit and judgment, which of all others, as I have proved it, are the most needful,—the most priz'd,—the most calamitous to be without, and consequently the hardest to come at,—for all these reasons put together, there is not a mortal amongst us, so destitute of a love of good fame or feeding,—or so ignorant of what will do him good therein,—who does not wish and stedfastly resolve in his own mind, to be, or to be thought at least master of the one or the other, and indeed of both of them, if the thing seems any way feasible, or likely to be brought to pass.

Now