Jonathan Swift Quotes

And he gave it for his opinion that whoever could make two ears of corn or two blades of grass to grow upon a spot of ground where only one grew before would deserve better of mankind and do more essential service to his country than the whole race of politicians put together.

When a true genius appears in the world you may know him by this sign that the dunces are all in confederacy against him.

There was all the world and his wife.

Falsehood 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: like a man, who hath thought of a good repartee when the discourse is changed, or the company parted; or like a physician, who hath found out an infallible medicine, after the patient is dead.

Usually speaking the worst-bred person in company is a young traveller just returned from abroad.

Yet, Malice never was his Aim;He lash'd the Vice but spar'd the Name. No individual could resent,Where thousands equally were meant. His Satry points at no Defect, But what all Mortals may correct...Verses on the death of Dr Swift

Zsa Zsa Gabor when asked which of the Gabor women was the oldest said "She'll never admit it but I believe it is Mama." When men grow virtuous in their old age they only make a sacrifice to God of the devil's leavings.

She wears her clothes as if they were thrown on her with a pitchfork.

What some invent the rest enlarge.

He likewise directed, “that every senator in the great council of a nation, after he had delivered his opinion, and argued in the defence of it, should be obliged to give his vote directly contrary; because if that were done, the result would infallibly terminate in the good of the public.

Very few men properly speaking live at present but are providing to live another time.

When the world has once begun to use us ill, it afterwards continues the same treatment with less scruple or ceremony, as men do to a whore.

I heard the little bird say so.

No wise man ever wished to be younger.

For this kind of commodity will not bear exportation, the flesh being of too tender a consistence to admit a long continuance in salt, although perhaps I could name a country which would be glad to eat up our whole nation without it.

We have just enough religion to make us hate, but not enough to make us love one another.

We of this age have discovered a shorter, and more prudent method to become scholars and wits, without the fatigue of reading or of thinking.

The stoical scheme of supplying our wants by lopping off our desires is like cutting off our feet when we want shoes.

The first springs of great events like those of great rivers are often mean and little.

I have been assured by a very knowing American of my acquaintance in London, that a young healthy child well nursed is at a year old a most delicious, nourishing, and wholesome food, whether stewed, roasted, baked, or boiled; and I make no doubt that it will equally serve in a fricassee or a ragout.