Jonathan Swift
Jonathan Swift
Jonathan Swiftwas an Anglo-Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer, poet and cleric who became Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth30 November 1667
CountryIreland
business men imagination
Men of great parts are often unfortunate in the management of public business, because they are apt to go out of the common road by the quickness of their imagination.
food sea swim
They say fish should swim thrice * * * first it should swim in the sea (do you mind me?) then it should swim in butter, and at last, sirrah, it should swim in good claret.
memories men literature
Observation is an old man's memory.
dirty men masters
Hail, follow, well met, All dirty and wet: Find out, if you can, Who's master, who's man.
men house mind
I have heard of a man who had a mind to sell his house, and therefore carried a piece of brick in his pocket, which he shewed as a pattern to encourage purchasers.
running book greek
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.
cutting razors lost
It is with wits as with razors, which are never so apt to cut those they are employed on as when they have lost their edge.
running oil sides
The tucked-up sempstress walks with hasty strides, While streams run down her oil'd umbrella's sides.
book language bigs
Big-endians and small-endians.
heaven ignorant
What they do in heaven we are ignorant of; what they do not do we are told expressly.
men providing another-time
Very few men, properly speaking, live at present, but are providing to live another time.
moon advice forget
I forget whether advice be among the lost things which Ariosto says are to be found in the moon: that and time ought to have been there.
men self inquiry
The motives of the best actions will not bear too strict an inquiry. It is allowed that the cause of most actions, good or bad, may be resolved into the love of ourselves; but the self-love of some men inclines them to please others, and the self-love of others is wholly employed in pleasing themselves. This makes the great distinction between virtue and vice.
fall sage morality
The system of morality to be gathered from the ancient sages falls very short of that delivered in the gospel.