“ It was that of the mind of a bigot to the pupil of the eye; the more light you pour on it, the more it contracts. ”
 Oliver Wendell Holmes Sr., The Autocrat of the Breakfast-Table (1858). copy citation

edit

“Since I had this experience, I hear that somebody else has related a similar story. I didn't borrow it, for all that.—I made a comparison at table some time since, which has often been quoted and received many compliments. It was that of the mind of a bigot to the pupil of the eye; the more light you pour on it, the more it contracts. The simile is a very obvious, and, I suppose I may now say, a happy one; for it has just been shown me that it occurs in a Preface to certain Political Poems of Thomas Moore's published long before my remark was repeated.” source

write a note