“It seems to me (said she) that you are in some brown study.”
Source: Euphues (Arber [1580]), P. 80. Compare: "A brown study", Jonathan Swift, Polite Conversation.
Help us to complete the source, original and additional information
John Lyly 29
English politician 1554–1606Related quotes

BBC Training "Interviews from hell" http://www.bbctraining.com/modules/2604/hell2.html. BBC INFAX http://open.bbc.co.uk/catalogue/infax/programme/SX+28015_9
BBC Interview, 21 June 1962

My Word! You Do Look Queer!

But I at once repudiated the suggestion as an impossible one, saying that I hated everything connected with the body, and could not bear the sight of a medical book.
... My favourite studies were history and metaphysics, and the very thought of dwelling on the physical structure of the body and its various ailments filled me with disgust.
pp. 27–28 https://books.google.com/books?id=GHkIAAAAIAAJ&pg=PA27
Pioneer Work in Opening the Medical Profession to Women (1895)

"If it is not," he replied, "when will it be?"
Lacydes, 5.
The Lives and Opinions of Eminent Philosophers (c. 200 A.D.), Book 4: The Academy

“Invention flags, his brain goes muddy,
And black despair succeeds brown study.”
"An Impossible Thing", line 105 (1720)