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The translators of the Bible were masters of an English style much fitter for that work than any we see in our present writings; the which is owing to the simplicity that runs through the whole.
Jonathan Swift -
Reason is a very light rider, and easily shook off.
Jonathan Swift
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A chuck under the chin is worth two kisses.
Jonathan Swift -
I have known some men possessed of good qualities which were very serviceable to others, but useless to themselves; like a sun-dial on the front of a house, to inform the neighbours and passengers, but not the owner within.
Jonathan Swift -
Power is no blessing in itself, except when it is used to protect the innocent.
Jonathan Swift -
One principal object of good-breeding is to suit our behaviour to the three several degrees of men, our superiors, our equals, and those below us.
Jonathan Swift -
Brutes find out where their talents lie; A bear will not attempt to fly, A foundered horse will oft debate Before he tries a five barred gate. A dog by instinct turns aside Who sees the ditch too deep and wide, But man we find the only creature Who, led by folly, combats nature; Who, when she loudly cries-Forbear! With obstinacy fixes there; And where the genius least inclines, Absurdly bends his whole designs.
Jonathan Swift -
They have likewise discovered two lesser stars, or satellites, which revolve around Mars, whereof the innermost is distant from the center of the primary exactly three of his diameters, and the outermost five: the former revolves in the space of ten hours, and the latter in twenty-one and a half, so that the squares of their periodical times are very near in the same proportion with the cubes of their distances from the center of Mars; which evidently shows them to be governed by the same Law of Gravitation that influences the other heavenly bodies.
Jonathan Swift
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Blot out, correct, insert, refine, enlarge, diminish, interline. Be mindful, when invention fails. To scratch your head and bite your nails.
Jonathan Swift -
Quotations are best brought in to confirm some opinion controverted.
Jonathan Swift -
The power of fortune is confessed only by the miserable, for the happy impute all their success to prudence or merit.
Jonathan Swift -
Philosophy! the lumber of the schools.
Jonathan Swift -
My hunger serves me instead of a clock.
Jonathan Swift -
I have ever hated all nations, professions, and communities, and all my love is toward individuals: for instance, I hate the tribe of lawyers, but I love Counsellor Such-a-one, and Judge Such-a-one: so with physicians - I will not speak of my own trade - soldiers, English, Scotch, French, and the rest. But principally I hate and detest that animal called man, although I heartily love John, Peter, Thomas, and so forth. This is the system upon which I have governed myself many years, but do not tell.
Jonathan Swift
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It is the talent of human nature to run from one extreme to another.
Jonathan Swift -
So endless and exorbitant are the desires of men that they will grasp at all, and can form no scheme of perfect happiness with less.
Jonathan Swift -
I love good creditable acquaintance; I love to be the worst of the company.
Jonathan Swift -
Those dreams that on the silent night intrude, and with false flitting shapes our minds delude ... are mere productions of the brain. And fools consult interpreters in vain.
Jonathan Swift -
But you think that it is time for me to have done with the world, and so I would if I could get into a better before I was called into the best, and not die here in a rage, like a poisoned rat in a hole.
Jonathan Swift -
There are few wild beasts more to be dreaded than a talking man having nothing to say.
Jonathan Swift
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Your notions of friendship are new to me; I believe every man is born with his quantum, and he cannot give to one without robbing another. I very well know to whom I would give the first place in my friendship, but they are not in the way, I am condemned to another scene, and therefore I distribute it in pennyworths to those about me, and who displease me least, and should do the same to my fellow prisoners if I were condemned to a jail.
Jonathan Swift -
Oh how our neighbour lifts his nose, To tell what every schoolboy knows.
Jonathan Swift -
Some dire misfortune to portend, no enemy can match a friend.
Jonathan Swift -
There were many times my pants were so thin I could sit on a dime and tell if it was heads or tails.
Jonathan Swift