Jonathan Swift Quotes
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There is no talent so useful toward rising in the world, or which puts men more out of the reach of fortune, than that quality generally possessed by the dullest sort of men, and in common speech called discretion; a species of lower prudence, by the assistance of which, people of the meanest intellectuals, without any other qualification, pass through the world in great tranquillity, and with universal good treatment, neither giving nor taking offence.
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I love white Portugal wine better than claret, champagne, or burgundy. I have a sad vulgar appetite.
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It is impossible that anything so natural, so necessary, and so universal as death, should ever have been designed by providence as an evil to mankind.
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Story-telling is subject to two unavoidable defects,--frequent repetition and being soon exhausted; so that, whoever values this gift in himself, has need of a good memory, and ought frequently to shift his company.
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There never appear more than five or six men of genius in an age, but if they were united the world could not stand before them.
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It often happens that, if a lie be believed only for an hour, it has done its work, and there is no further occasion for it.
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When a true genius appears, you can know him by this sign: that all the dunces are in a confederacy against him.
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Men of wit, learning and virtue might strike out every offensive or unbecoming passage from plays.
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It is in disputes as in armies, where the weaker side sets up false lights, and makes a great noise, to make the enemy believe them more numerous and strong than they really are.
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Books, the children of the brain.
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Books, like men their authors, have no more than one wayofcoming intothe world, but there areten thousand to go out of it, and return no more.
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Poor nations are hungry, and rich nations are proud; and pride and hunger will ever be at variance.
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I have now lost my barrier between me and death; God grant I may live to be as well prepared for it, as I confidently believe her to have been! If the way to Heaven be through piety, truth, justice and charity, she is there.
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The first springs of great events, like those of great rivers, are often mean and little.
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Complaint is the largest tribute heaven receives and the sincerest part of our devotion.
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Ever eating, never cloying, All-devouring, all-destroying Never finding full repast, Till I eat the world at last.
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If a man will observe as he walks the streets, I believe he will find the merriest countenances in mourning coaches.
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We are so fond on one another because our ailments are the same.
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"Lawyers Are": Those whose interests and abilities lie in perverting, confounding and eluding the law.
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The sight of you is good for sore eyes.
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Whoe'er excels in what we prize, Appears a hero in our eyes; Each girl, when pleased with what is taught, Will have the teacher in her thought. . . . . A blockhead with melodious voice, In boarding-schools may have his choice.
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War: that mad game the world so loves to play.
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Some men, under the notion of weeding out prejudice, eradicate virtue, honesty and religion.
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Would a writer know how to behave himself with relation td posterity? Let him consider in old books what he finds that he is glad to know, and what omissions he most laments.