"Only the brave know how to forgive... a coward never forgave; it is not in his nature"
About this Quote
Forgiveness gets recast here as an act of nerve, not niceness. Sterne flips the usual moral hierarchy: the “good” person isn’t the gentle soul who lets things slide, but the brave one who can stomach the psychological risk of releasing a grievance. That’s the sting in the line’s design. It refuses to treat forgiveness as an automatic virtue; it makes it a test of character under pressure.
The barb at “a coward never forgave” isn’t really about battlefield fear. It’s about the smaller, more familiar cowardice of self-protection: the need to keep an injury alive because it props up a story where you’re permanently right, permanently wronged, permanently owed. To forgive is to surrender a weapon. Resentment can feel like control, and Sterne understands that the person who can’t forgive is often the person most invested in the leverage of pain.
As an 18th-century novelist and cleric-adjacent satirist (best known for Tristram Shandy’s comic intelligence and moral seriousness), Sterne is working in a culture where “sensibility” was becoming fashionable: refined feeling as social capital. This line quietly mocks that performance. Forgiveness isn’t sentimental display; it’s inner fortitude. The ellipsis does real work too, a theatrical pause that turns the second clause into a verdict. Not in his nature: a cold, almost scientific dismissal. The subtext is uncomfortable on purpose: if you’re clinging to your grudge, it’s not proof of standards. It’s proof of fear.
The barb at “a coward never forgave” isn’t really about battlefield fear. It’s about the smaller, more familiar cowardice of self-protection: the need to keep an injury alive because it props up a story where you’re permanently right, permanently wronged, permanently owed. To forgive is to surrender a weapon. Resentment can feel like control, and Sterne understands that the person who can’t forgive is often the person most invested in the leverage of pain.
As an 18th-century novelist and cleric-adjacent satirist (best known for Tristram Shandy’s comic intelligence and moral seriousness), Sterne is working in a culture where “sensibility” was becoming fashionable: refined feeling as social capital. This line quietly mocks that performance. Forgiveness isn’t sentimental display; it’s inner fortitude. The ellipsis does real work too, a theatrical pause that turns the second clause into a verdict. Not in his nature: a cold, almost scientific dismissal. The subtext is uncomfortable on purpose: if you’re clinging to your grudge, it’s not proof of standards. It’s proof of fear.
Quote Details
| Topic | Forgiveness |
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