Jonathan Swift citations

Page 2

“La vision est l'art de voir les choses invisibles.”

“Je ne puis tirer qu'une conclusion : c'est que les gens de votre race forment, dans leur ensemble, la plus odieuse petite vermine à qui la Nature ait jamais permis de ramper à la surface de la terre.”

“Cette méthode stoïque de subvenir à nos besoins en supprimant nos désirs, équivaut à se couper les pieds pour n’avoir plus besoin de chaussure.”

“Les caprices de l'espèce femelle ne sont pas limités à une seule partie du monde ni à un seul climat, [ils] sont bien plus généraux qu'on ne pourrait l'imaginer.”

“Vous avez fort bien prouvé que l'ignorance, la paresse et le vice peuvent être quelquefois les seules qualités d'un homme d'État; que les lois sont expliquées, interprétées et appliquées le mieux possible par des gens que l'intérêt et la rapacité portent à les dénaturer, à les embrouiller et à les éluder.”

“Satire is a sort of glass wherein beholders do generally discover everybody’s face but their own; which is the chief reason for that kind reception it meets with in the world, and that so very few are offended with it.”

“Happiness is the perpetual possession of being well deceived.”

“That was excellently observed’, say I, when I read a passage in an author, where his opinion agrees with mine. When we differ, there I pronounce him to be mistaken.”

“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.”

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

“Some men, under the notion of weeding out prejudice, eradicate virtue, honesty and religion.”

“The latter part of a wise man’s life is taken up in curing the follies, prejudices, and false opinions he had contracted in the former.”

“Ever eating, never cloying,
All-devouring, all-destroying
Never finding full repast,
Till I eat the world at last.”

“Difference in opinions has cost many millions of lives: for instance, whether flesh be bread, or bread be flesh; whether the juice of a certain berry be blood or wine.”

“A soldier is a "Yahoo" hired to kill in cold blood as many of his own Species, who have never offended him, as possibly he can.”

“This made me reflect, how vain an attempt it is for a man to endeavor to do himself honor among those who are out of all degree of equality or comparison with him.”

“The best doctors in the world are Doctor Diet, Doctor Quiet, and Doctor Merryman.”

“I won't quarrel with my bread and butter.”

“Men are contented to be laughed at for their wit, but not for their folly.”

“Promises and pie-crust are made to be broken.”

“It is impossible that any thing so natural, so necessary, and so universal as death, should ever have been designed by Providence as an evil to mankind.”

“I mean you lie—under a mistake.”

“That's as well said, as if I had said it myself.”

“There is, indeed, no wild beast more to be dreaded than a communicative man having nothing to communicate.”

“Bread is the staff of life.”

“Tis very warm weather when one's in bed.”

“This evil fortune, which generally attends extraordinary men in the management of great affairs, has been imputed to divers causes, that need not be here set down, when so obvious a one occurs, if what a certain writer observes be true, that when a great genius appears in the world the dunces are all in confederacy against him.”

“She looks as if butter wou'dn't melt in her mouth.”

“He is taller by almost the breadth of my nail, than any of his court, which alone is enough to strike an awe into the beholders.”

“A set of phrases learnt by rote;
A passion for a scarlet coat;
When at a play to laugh, or cry,
Yet cannot tell the reason why:
Never to hold her tongue a minute;
While all she prates has nothing in it.”

“I love good creditable acquaintance; I love to be the worst of the company.”

“Poor Nations are hungry, and rich Nations are proud, and Pride and Hunger will ever be at Variance.”

“Those dreams that on the silent night intrude,
And with false flitting shapes our minds delude
… are mere productions of the brain.
And fools consult interpreters in vain.”

“And he gave it for his opinion, that whosoever 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.”