Jonathan Swift Quotes

Of so little weight are the greatest services to princes, when put into the balance with a refusal to gratify their passions. ~ Jonathan Swift

Rebukes are easy from our betters,
From men of quality and letters;
But when low dunces will affront,
What man alive can stand the brunt? ~ Jonathan Swift

I'm up and down and round about, Yet all the world can't find me out; Though hundreds have employed their leisure, They never yet could find my measure. ~ Jonathan Swift

The more careless, the more modish. ~ Jonathan Swift

Real vision is the ability to see the invisible. ~ Jonathan Swift

Books, the children of the brain. ~ Jonathan Swift

I had as I before observed, one private pocket, which escaped their search, wherein there was a pair of spectacles (which I sometimes use for the weakness of mine eyes,) a pocket perspective, and some other little conveniences; which, being of no consequence to the emperor, I did not think myself bound in honour to discover, and I apprehended they might be lost or spoiled if I ventured them out of my possession. , ~ Jonathan Swift

And, is not Virtue in Mankind
The Nutriment that feeds the Mind? ~ Jonathan Swift

Opium is not so stupefying to many persons as an afternoon sermon. ~ Jonathan Swift

For they have no conception how a rational creature can be compelled, but only advised, or exhorted; because no person can disobey reason, without giving up his claim to be a rational creature. ~ Jonathan Swift

No preacher is listened to but time, which gives us the same train and turn of thought that elder people have in vain tried to put into our heads before. ~ Jonathan Swift

The tiny Lilliputians surmise that Gulliver's watch may be his god, because it is that which, he admits, he seldom does anything without consulting. ~ Jonathan Swift

I was in the utmost astonishment, and roared so loud that they all ran back in a fright; and some of them, as I was afterwards told, were hurt with the falls they got by leaping from my sides upon the ground. However, they soon returned, ~ Jonathan Swift

As learnèd commentators view
In Homer more than Homer knew. ~ Jonathan Swift

I remember it was with extreme difficulty that I could bring my master to understand the meaning of the word opinion, or how a point could be disputable; because reason taught us to affirm or deny only where we are certain; and beyond our knowledge we cannot do either. ~ Jonathan Swift

Neither is it safe to count upon the weakness of any man's understanding, who is thoroughly possessed of the spirit of revenge to sharpen his invention. ~ Jonathan Swift

Sweeping from butcher's stalls, dung, guts, and blood,
Drown'd puppies, stinking sprats, all drench'd in mud,
Dead cats, and turnip-tops, come tumbling down the flood. ~ Jonathan Swift

However, in my thoughts I could not sufficiently wonder at the intrepidity of these diminutive mortals, who durst venture to mount and walk upon my body, while one of my hands was at liberty, without trembling at the very sight of so prodigious a creature as I must appear to them. ~ Jonathan Swift

She 's no chicken; she 's on the wrong side of thirty, if she be a day. ~ Jonathan Swift

A Child will make two Dishes at an Entertainment for Friends; and when the Family dines alone, the fore or hind Quarter will makea reasonable Dish; and seasoned with a little Pepper or Salt, will be very good Boiled on the fourth Day, especially in Winter. ~ Jonathan Swift

The emperor of Lilliput, attended by several of the nobility, comes to see the author in his confinement. The emperor's person and habit described. Learned men appointed to teach the author their language. He gains favour by his mild disposition. His pockets are searched, and his sword and pistols taken from him. ~ Jonathan Swift

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. ~ Jonathan Swift

So, naturalists observe, a flea; Hath smaller fleas that on him prey; And these have smaller fleas to bite 'em, And so proceed ad infinitum. ~ Jonathan Swift

What vexes me most is, that my female friends, who could bear me very well a dozen years ago, have now forsaken me, although I am not so old in proportion to them as I formerly was: which I can prove by arithmetic, for then I was double their age, which now I am not. Letter to Alexander Pope. 7 Feb. 1736. ~ Jonathan Swift

Nothing is so great an instance of ill-manners as flattery. ~ Jonathan Swift

As soon as I entered the house, my wife took me in her arms, and kissed me; at which, having not been used to the touch of that odious animal for so many years, I fell into a swoon for almost an hour. At the time I am writing, it is five years since my last return to England. During the first year, I could not endure my wife or children in my presence; the very smell of them was intolerable; much less could I suffer them to eat in the same room. To this hour they dare not presume to touch my bread, or drink out of the same cup, neither was I ever able to let one of them take me by the hand. The first money I laid out was to buy two young stone-horses, which I keep in a good stable; and next to them, the groom is my greatest favourite, for I feel my spirits revived by the smell he contracts in the stable. My horses understand me tolerably well; I converse with them at least four hours every day. They are strangers to bridle or saddle; they live in great amity with me and friendship to each other. ~ Jonathan Swift

The first springs of great events, like those of great rivers, are often mean and little. ~ Jonathan Swift

That the universe was formed by a fortuitous concourse of atoms, I will no more believe than that the accidental jumbling of the alphabet would fall into a most ingenious treatise of philosophy. ~ Jonathan Swift

Fine words! I wonder where you stole them. ~ Jonathan Swift

A little grain of the romance is no ill ingredient to preserve and exalt the dignity of human nature, without which it is apt to degenerate into everything that is sordid, vicious and low. ~ Jonathan Swift

In all distresses of our friends We first consult our private ends; While Nature, kindly bent to ease us, Points out some circumstance to please us. ~ Jonathan Swift

The worst mark you can recieve is a promise, especially when it is confirmed with an oath; after which every man retires, and gives over all hopes. (referring to Chief Minister of State) ~ Jonathan Swift

I am of the level with common Astrologers; who, with an old paltry cant, and a few pot-hooks for planets to amuse the vulgar, have too long been suffered to abuse the world. ~ Jonathan Swift

All fits of pleasure are balanced by an equal degree of pain and languor; it's like spending this year part of next year's revenue. ~ Jonathan Swift

and the first words I learnt, were to express my desire "that he would please give me my liberty;" which I every day repeated on my knees. His ~ Jonathan Swift

Brutes find out where their talents lie; a bear will not attempt to fly. ~ Jonathan Swift

But he may please to consider, that the caprices of womankind are not limited by any climate or nation; and that they are much more uniform than can be easily imagined. ~ Jonathan Swift

But as human happiness is of a very short duration, so in those days were human fashions upon which it entirely depends. ~ Jonathan Swift

Some time after, asking a friend at court how they came to fix on that determinate number, he told me that his majesty's mathematicians, having taken the height of my body by the help of a quadrant, and finding it to exceed theirs in the proportion of twelve to one, they concluded from the similarity of their bodies, that mine must contain at least 1724 of theirs, and consequently would require as much food as was necessary to support that number of Lilliputians. By ~ Jonathan Swift

before I got to the shore, which I conjectured was about eight o'clock in the evening. I then advanced forward near half a mile, but could not discover any sign of houses or inhabitants; at least I was in so weak a condition, that I did not observe them. I was extremely tired, and with that, and the heat of the weather, and about half a pint of brandy that I drank as I left the ship, I found myself much inclined to sleep. I lay down on the grass, which was very short and soft, where I slept sounder than ever I remembered to have done in my life, and, as I reckoned, about nine hours; for when I awaked, it was just day-light. I attempted to rise, but was not able to stir: for, as I happened to lie on my back, I found my arms and legs were strongly fastened on each side to the ground; and my hair, which was long ~ Jonathan Swift

asked me, "what were the usual causes or motives that made one country go to war with another?" I answered "they were innumerable; but I should only mention a few of the chief. Sometimes the ambition of princes, who never think they have land or people enough to govern; sometimes the corruption of ministers, who engage their master in a war, in order to stifle or divert the clamour of the subjects against their evil administration. ~ Jonathan Swift

The most brilliant satire of all time was 'A Modest Proposal' by Jonathan Swift. You'll notice how everything got straightened out in Ireland within days of that coming out. ~ P. J. O'Rourke

Truth shines the brighter clad in verse. ~ Jonathan Swift

It is in men as in soils where sometimes there is a vein of gold which the owner knows not. ~ Jonathan Swift

They look upon fraud as a greater crime than theft, and therefore seldom fail to punish it with death; for they allege, that care and vigilance, with a very common understanding, may preserve a man's goods from thieves, but honesty has no defence against superior cunning; and, since it is necessary that there should be a perpetual intercourse of buying and selling, and dealing upon credit, where fraud is permitted and connived at, or has no law to punish it, the honest dealer is always undone, and the knave gets the advantage. ~ Jonathan Swift

Many a truth is told in jest. ~ Jonathan Swift

Reasoning will never make a man correct an ill opinion, which by reasoning he never acquired ~ Jonathan Swift

Venus, a beautiful, good-natured lady, was the goddess of love; Juno, a terrible shrew, the goddess of marriage: and they were always mortal enemies. ~ Jonathan Swift

O Grub Street! how do I bemoan thee, whose graceless children scorn to own thee! . Yet thou hast greater cause to be ashamed of them, than they of thee. ~ Jonathan Swift

In all I wish, how happy should I be,
Thou grand Deluder, were it not for thee?
So weak thou art that fools thy power despise;
And yet so strong, thou triumph'st o'er the wise. ~ Jonathan Swift

Every age might perhaps produce one or two geniuses, if they were not sunk under the censure and obloquy of plodding, servile, imitating pedants. ~ Jonathan Swift

He acted every part of an orator, and I could observe many periods of threatenings, and others of promises, pity, and kindness. I answered in a few words, but in the most submissive manner, lifting up my left hand, and both my eyes to the sun, as calling him for a witness; and being almost famished with hunger, having not eaten a morsel for some hours before I left the ship, I found the demands of nature so strong upon me, that I could not forbear showing my impatience (perhaps against the strict rules of decency) by putting my finger frequently to my mouth, to signify that I wanted food. The hurgo ~ Jonathan Swift

I cannot but conclude that the Bulk of your Natives, to be the most pernicious Race of little odious Vermin that Nature ever suffered to crawl upon the Surface of the Earth. ~ Jonathan Swift

Great abilities, when employed as God directs, do but make the owners of them greater and more painful servants to their neighbors. ~ Jonathan Swift

An idle reason lessens the weight of the good ones you gave before. ~ Jonathan Swift

They have a notion, that when people are met together, a short silence does much improve conversation: this I found to be true; for during those little intermissions of talk, new ideas would arise in their minds, which very much enlivened the discourse. ~ Jonathan Swift

We have an intuitive sense of our duty. ~ Jonathan Swift

Exploding many things under the name of trifles is a very false proof either of wisdom or magnanimity, and a great check to virtuous actions with regard to fame. ~ Jonathan Swift

That his majesty gave many marks of his great lenity, often ~ Jonathan Swift

For poetry, he's past his prime,
He takes an hour to find a rhyme;
His fire is out, his wit decayed,
His fancy sunk, his muse a jade.
I'd have him throw away his pen,
But there's no talking to some men. ~ Jonathan Swift

My master and his friends continued on the shore till I was almost out of sight; and I often heard the sorrel nag (who always loved me) crying out, "Hnuy illa nyha, majah Yahoo;" "Take care of thyself, gentle Yahoo. ~ Jonathan Swift

It is pleasant to observe how free the present age is in laying taxes on the next. "Future ages shall talk of this; they shall be famous to all posterity;" whereas their time and thoughts will be taken up about present things, as ours are now. ~ Jonathan Swift

A traveler's chief aim should be to make men wiser and better, and to improve their minds by the bad-as well as good example of what they deliver concerning foreign places. ~ Jonathan Swift

The tucked-up sempstress walks with hasty strides, While streams run down her oil'd umbrella's sides. ~ Jonathan Swift

Vision is the art of seeing what is invisible to others. ~ Jonathan Swift

When a real genius appeares in this world, you'll know him by the fact that all the fools have allied against him. ~ Jonathan Swift

Nor do they trust their tongue alone, but speak a language of their own; can read a nod, a shrug, a look, far better than a printed book; convey a libel in a frown, and wink a reputation down. ~ Jonathan Swift

I have one word to say upon the subject of profound writers, who are grown very numerous of late; and I know very well the judicious world is resolved to list me in that number. I conceive therefore, as to the business of being profound, that it is with writers as with wells; a person with good eyes may see to the bottom of the deepest, provided any water be there; and often, when there is nothing in the world at the bottom, besides dryness and dirt, though it be but a yard and half under ground, it shall pass however for wondrous deep, upon no wiser a reason than because it is wondrous dark. ~ Jonathan Swift

All human race would be wits. And millions miss, for one that hits. ~ Jonathan Swift

Where Young must torture his invention To flatter knaves, or lose his pension. ~ Jonathan Swift

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. ~ Jonathan Swift

I never wonder to see men wicked, but I often wonder to see them not ashamed. ~ Jonathan Swift

Unjustly poets we asperse: Truth shines the brighter clad in verse, And all the fictions they pursue Do but insinuate what is true. ~ Jonathan Swift

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. ~ Jonathan Swift

Polite Conversation 'Tis happy for him, that his father was before him. ~ Jonathan Swift

Though Diogenes lived in a tub, there might be, for aught I know, as much pride under his rags, as in the fine-spun garments of the divine Plato. ~ Jonathan Swift

But you think that it is time for me to have done with the world, and so I would if I could get into a better before I was called into the best, and not die here in a rage, like a poisoned rat in a hole. ~ Jonathan Swift

I won't quarrel with my bread and butter. ~ Jonathan Swift

Hobbes clearly proves, that every creature Lives in a state of war by nature. ~ Jonathan Swift

I'll give you leave to call me anything, if you don't call me spade. ~ Jonathan Swift

So that, upon the whole, there must be some kind of subjection due from every man to every man, which cannot be made void by any power, pre-eminence, or authority whatsoever. ~ Jonathan Swift

Nothing is so hard for those who abound in riches as to conceive how others can be in want. ~ Jonathan Swift

Tis nothing when you are used to it. ~ Jonathan Swift

Three kings protested to me, that in their whole reigns they never did once prefer any person of merit, unless by mistake, or treachery of some minister in whom they confided; neither would they do it if they were to live again: and they showed, with great strength of reason, that the royal throne could not be supported without corruption, because that positive, confident, restive temper, which virtue infused into a man, was a perpetual clog to public business. ~ Jonathan Swift

When I am in danger of bursting, I will go and whisper among the reeds. ~ Jonathan Swift

When a man of genius appears in the world, it is immediately recognized by the fact that all the blockheads join forces against him. ~ Jonathan Swift

The atheists, libertines, despisers of religion ... that is to say all those who usually pass under the name of Free-thinkers. ~ Jonathan Swift

Come hither, all ye empty things,
Ye bubbles rais'd by breath of Kings;
Who float upon the tide of state,
Come hither, and behold your fate.
Let pride be taught by this rebuke,
How very mean a thing's a Duke;
From all his ill-got honours flung,
Turn'd to that dirt from whence he sprung. ~ Jonathan Swift

Religion seems to have grown an infant with age, and requires miracles to nurse it, as it had in its infancy. ~ Jonathan Swift

I have now lost my barrier between me and death; God grant I may live to be as well prepared for it, as I confidently believe her to have been! If the way to Heaven be through piety, truth, justice and charity, she is there. ~ Jonathan Swift

Quotations are best brought in to confirm some opinion controverted. ~ Jonathan Swift

felt great numbers of people on my left side relaxing the cords to such a degree, that I was able to turn upon my right, and to ease myself with making water; which I very plentifully did, to the great astonishment of the people; who, conjecturing by my motion what I was going to do, immediately opened to the right and left on that side, to avoid the torrent, which fell with such noise and violence from ~ Jonathan Swift

I never knew any man cured of inattention. ~ Jonathan Swift

I hate nobody: I am in charity with the world. ~ Jonathan Swift

Arbitrary power is the natural object of temptation to a prince, as wine and women to a young fellow, or a bribe to a judge, or avarice to old age ... ~ Jonathan Swift

Men always grow vicious before they become unbelievers. ~ Jonathan Swift

To acknowledge you were wrong yesterday is simply to let the world know that you are wiser today than you were then. ~ Jonathan Swift

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. ~ Jonathan Swift

No man will take counsel, but every man will take money. Therefore, money is better than counsel. ~ Jonathan Swift

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. ~ Jonathan Swift