Oliver Goldsmith
Oliver Goldsmith
Oliver Goldsmithwas an Irish novelist, playwright and poet, who is best known for his novel The Vicar of Wakefield, his pastoral poem The Deserted Village, and his plays The Good-Natur'd Manand She Stoops to Conquer. He is thought to have written the classic children's tale The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth10 November 1730
CountryIreland
sorrow mankind let-me
Here let me sit in sorrow for mankind.
talking errors talkative
Error is always talkative.
imagination entertainment taste
Taste is the power of relishing or rejecting whatever is offered for the entertainment of the imagination.
teaching men gains
Teach erring man to spurn the rage of gain.
wise kings real
Titles and mottoes to books are like escutcheons and dignities in the hands of a king. The wise sometimes condescend to accept of them; but none but a fool would imagine them of any real importance. We ought to depend upon intrinsic merit, and not the slender helps of the title.
land rose wealth
But times are alter'd; trade's unfeeling train Usurp the land, and dispossess the swain; Along the lawn, where scatter'd hamlets rose, Unwieldy wealth and cumbrous pomp repose.
country travel thinking
There is probably no country so barbarous that would not disclose all it knew, if it received equivalent information; and I am apt to think that a person who was ready to give more knowledge than he received would be welcome wherever he came.
travel views china
Let observation with observant view, Observe mankind from China to Peru.
want pleasure source
Every want that stimulates the breast becomes a source of pleasure when redressed.
perfect may tables
Wit generally succeeds more from being happily addressed than from its native poignancy. A jest, calculated to spread at a gaming-table, may be received with, perfect indifference should it happen to drop in a mackerel-boat.
heart men gains
A man's own heart must ever be given to gain that of another.
friends blessing dwelling
Eternal blessings crown my earliest friend, And round his dwelling guardian saints attend.
philosophy stubborn sullen
All that philosophy can teach is to be stubborn or sullen under misfortunes.
country character men
I fancy the character of a poet is in every country the same,--fond of enjoying the present, careless of the future; his conversation that of a man of sense, his actions those of a fool.