Wise people are never less alone than when they are alone.
JONATHAN SWIFTWise people are never less alone than when they are alone.
JONATHAN SWIFTAnd 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.
JONATHAN SWIFTI’m as old as my tongue and a little older than my teeth.
JONATHAN SWIFTReasoning will never make a man correct an ill opinion, which by reasoning he never acquired
JONATHAN SWIFTAlthough men are accused of not knowing their own weakness, yet perhaps few know their own strength. It is in men as in soils, where sometimes there is a vein of gold which the owner knows not of.
JONATHAN SWIFTSatire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody’s face but their own.
JONATHAN SWIFTNothing is so hard for those who abound in riches as to conceive how others can be in want.
JONATHAN SWIFTIt is a miserable thing to live in suspense; it is the life of the spider.
JONATHAN SWIFTThe common fluency of speech in many men, and most women, is owing to a scarcity of matter and a scarcity of words; for whosoever is a master of language, and hath a mind full of ideas, will be apt, in speaking, to hesitate upon the choice of both.
JONATHAN SWIFTI love good creditable acquaintance; I love to be the worst of the company.
JONATHAN SWIFTDon’t set your wit against a child.
JONATHAN SWIFTFalsehood flies, and truth comes limping after it, so that when men come to be undeceived, it is too late; the jest is over, and the tale hath had its effect.
JONATHAN SWIFTAlthough the devil be the father of lies, he seems, like other great inventors, to have lost much of his reputation by the continual improvements that have been made upon him.
JONATHAN SWIFTIt is the talent of human nature to run from one extreme to another.
JONATHAN SWIFTPoor nations are hungry, and rich nations are proud; and pride and hunger will ever be at variance.
JONATHAN SWIFTWhen I am reading a book, whether wise or silly, it seems to me to be alive and talking to me.
JONATHAN SWIFT