How we cite our quotes:
Quote #4
Nothing in the whole affair provoked him so much as the condolences of his friends, and the foolish figure they should make at church the first Sunday (1.16.3)
Mr. Shandy's major preoccupation on the journey back to Shandy Hall from London after Mrs. Shandy's fake pregnancy isn't his wife's health but the fact that people are going to think he's foolish. Of course, being afraid of looking dumb just makes you act dumber. Just think, if Mr. Shandy hadn't wanted to get back at his wife by making her give birth in the country, Tristram's nose would never have been broken.
Quote #5
I would sooner undertake to explain the hardest problem in Geometry than pretend to account for it, that a gentleman of my father's great good sense,—knowing, as the reader must have observed him, and curious too in philosophy,—wise also in political reasoning,—and in polemical (as he will find) no way ignorant,—could be capable of entertaining a notion in his head, so out of the common track (1.19.1)
Good sense and learning won't keep a person from foolishness, so you might as well just embrace it—even someone as learned as Mr. Shandy can have crazy ideas. (Although—it does seem like Tristram is gently making fun of his father, here. Are we really supposed to believe that Tristram thinks his father has good sense? Doesn't seem likely.)
Quote #6
but as a warning to the learned reader against the indiscreet reception of such guests who, after a free and undisturbed entrance, for some years, into our brains,—at length claim a kind of settlement there,—working sometimes like yeast;—but more generally after the manner of the gentle passion, beginning in jest,—but ending in downright earnest. (1.19.5)
Here's a little warning that foolishness can sneak up on a person. Over the years, jokes can gradually turn someone into a full-fledged nut; one cat can turn into 550; and the story of your life can turn into a nine-volume masterpiece of digression.