| "He told me, that he had twelve or fourteen times attempted to keep a journal of his life, but never could persevere. He advised me to do it. `The great thing to be recorded, (said he,) is the state of your own mind; and you should write down every thing that you remember, for you cannot judge at first what is good or bad; and write immediately while the impression is fresh, for it will not be the same a week afterwards.'"
Boswell's Life of Johnson (paperback, Oxford University Press, 1980 based on revised edition of 1970, ed. R. W. Chapman), p. 513. | 
