Jonathan Swift Quotes
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For the rest, whatever we have got has been by infinite labor, and search, and ranging through every corner of nature; the difference is that instead of dirt and poison, we have rather chosen to fill our hives with honey and wax, thus furnishing mankind with the two noblest of things, which are sweetness and light.
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If they would, for Example, praise the Beauty of a Woman, or any other Animal, they describe it by Rhombs, Circles, Parallelograms, Ellipses, and other geometrical terms.
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There are few, very few, that will own themselves in a mistake.
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Live every day as your last, because one of these days, it will be.
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The sight of you is good for sore eyes.
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A nice man is a man of nasty ideas.
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She watches him as a cat would watch a mouse.
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Neither are any wars so furious and bloody, or of so long continuance as those occasioned by difference in opinion, especially if it be in things indifferent.
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Every man desires to live long, but no man wishes to be old.
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From not the gravest of Divines, Accept for once some serious Lines.
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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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There seems to be no part of knowledge in fewer hands than that of discerning when to have done.
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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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The first springs of great events, like those of great rivers, are often mean and little.
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And surely one of the best rules in conversation is, never to say a thing which any of the company can reasonably wish had been left unsaid.
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Men of wit, learning and virtue might strike out every offensive or unbecoming passage from plays.
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The various opinions of philosophers have scattered through the world as many plagues of the mind as Pandora's box did those of the body; only with this difference, that they have not left hope at the bottom.
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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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There is nothing constant in this world but inconsistency.
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Few are qualified to shine in company, but it is in most men's power to be agreeable.
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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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A forward critic often dupes us With sham quotations peri hupsos, And if we have not read Longinus, Will magisterially outshine us. Then, lest with Greek he over-run ye, Procure the book for love or money, Translated from Boileau's translation, And quote quotation on quotation.
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A footman may swear; but he cannot swear like a lord. He can swear as often: but can he swear with equal delicacy, propriety, and judgment?
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Conversation is but carving! Give no more to every guest Than he's able to digest.