Jonathan Swift
Jonathan Swift
Jonathan Swiftwas an Anglo-Irish satirist, essayist, political pamphleteer, poet and cleric who became Dean of St Patrick's Cathedral, Dublin...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionWriter
Date of Birth30 November 1667
CountryIreland
astrology long abuse
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.
years age three
Say, Britain, could you ever boast, Three poets in an age at most? Our chilling climate hardly bears A sprig of bays in fifty years.
contracted curing false latter life opinions taken
The latter part of a man's life is taken up in curing the follies, prejudices, and false opinions he had contracted in the former.
circles world down-and
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.
applied best interest laws whose
Laws are best explained, interpreted and applied by those whose interest and abilities lie in perverting, confounding and eluding them
almost fall fourteen girls love shall soon
I have almost done with harridans, and shall soon become old enough to fall in love with girls of fourteen
men providing another-time
Very few men, properly speaking, live at present, but are providing to live another time.
men weather together
Under this window in stormy weather I marry this man and woman together; Let none but Him who rules the thunder Put this man and woman asunder.
men shining half
Nature has left every man a capacity of being agreeable, though not of shining in company; and there are a hundred men sufficiently qualified for both who, by a very few faults, that they might correct in half an hour, are not so much as tolerable.
fall angel men
For in that universal call, Few bankers will to heaven be mounters; They'll cry, "Ye shops, upon us fall! Conceal and cover us, ye counters! When other hands the scales shall hold, And they, in men's and angels' sight Produced with all their bills and gold, 'Weigh'd in the balance and found light!'
wise time age
The latter part of a wise person's life is occupied with curing the follies, prejudices and false opinions they contracted earlier.
funny life time
No man was ever so completely skilled in the conduct of life, as not to receive new information from age and experience.
hate animal love-is
I have ever hated all nations, professions, and communities, and all my love is toward individuals: for instance, I hate the tribe of lawyers, but I love Counsellor Such-a-one, and Judge Such-a-one: so with physicians—I will not speak of my own trade—soldiers, English, Scotch, French, and the rest. But principally I hate and detest that animal called man, although I heartily love John, Peter, Thomas, and so forth. This is the system upon which I have governed myself many years, but do not tell...
wise philosophy men
Such a man, truly wise, creams off Nature leaving the sour and the dregs for philosophy and reason to lap up.