Jonathan Swift Quotes

“Life is a tragedy wherein we sit as spectators for a while and then act our part in it.”

“The chameleon, who is said to feed upon nothing but air, has of all animals the nimblest tongue.”

“Some dire misfortune to portend, no enemy can match a friend.”

“The preaching of divines helps to preserve well-inclined men in the course of virtue, but seldom or ever reclaims the vicious.”

“If the men of wit and genius would resolve never to complain in their works of critics and detractors, the next age would not know that they ever had any.”

“Argument, as usually managed, is the worst sort of conversation, as it is generally in books the worst sort of reading.”

“For want of a block, man will stumble at a straw.”

“Vision is the Art of seeing Things invisible.”

“Pride, ill nature, and want of sense, are the three great sources of ill manners.”

“Party is the madness of many for the gain of a few.”

“The scholars of Ireland seem not to have the least conception of style, but run on in a flat phraseology, often mingled with barbarous terms.”

“It is a maxim, that those, to whom everybody allows the second place, have an undoubted title to the first.”

“Great abilities, when employed as God directs, do but make the owners of them greater and more painful servants to their neighbors.”

“The tucked-up sempstress walks with hasty strides, While streams run down her oil'd umbrella's sides.”

“Nothing is so hard for those who abound in riches as to conceive how others can be in want.”

“hoever wishes to win in this game must have patience and money, since the values are so little constant and the rumors so little founded on truth Vision is the art of seeing things invisible.”

“You should never be ashamed to admit you have been wrong. It only proves you are wiser today than yesterday”

“Old sciences are unraveled like old stockings, by beginning at the foot.”

“In all I wish, how happy should I be,Thou grand Deluder, were it not for thee?So weak thou art that fools thy power despise;And yet so strong, thou triumph'st o'er the wise.”

“If a man makes me keep my distance, the comfort is, he keeps his at the same time.”

“All fits of pleasure are balanced by an equal degree of pain or languor; it is like spending this year part of the next year's revenue.”

“There are certain common privileges of a writer, the benefit whereof, I hope, there will be no reason to doubt; particularly, that where I am not understood, it shall be concluded, that something very useful and profound is couched underneath; and again, that whatever word or sentence is printed in a different character, shall be judged to contain something extraordinary either or wit of sublime.”

“A chuck under the chin is worth two kisses.”

“I have always a sacred veneration for anyone I observe to be a little out of repair in his person, as supposing him either a poet or a philosopher.”

“Two friendships in two breasts requires The same aversions and desires.”