Oliver Goldsmith
Oliver Goldsmith
Oliver Goldsmithwas an Irish novelist, playwright and poet, who is best known for his novel The Vicar of Wakefield, his pastoral poem The Deserted Village, and his plays The Good-Natur'd Manand She Stoops to Conquer. He is thought to have written the classic children's tale The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes...
NationalityIrish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth10 November 1730
CountryIreland
argument furnish intellects
I find you want me to furnish you with argument and intellects too.
eloquence rules speak subject thoroughly
To feel your subject thoroughly and to speak without fear, are the only rules of eloquence
cast knew pleased whistle
He cast off his friends as a huntsman his pack, for he knew when he pleased he could whistle them back.
brighter dull led tried
He tried each art, reproved each dull delay./ Allured to brighter worlds, and led the way.
applause happiness keeping seeks
He who seeks for applause only from without has all his happiness in another's keeping
becomes coffin handsome
I am told he makes a very handsome corpse, and becomes his coffin prodigiously.
govern thoughts-and-thinking
Those that think must govern those that toil.
beside fence
Beside yon straggling fence that skirts the way, / With blossomed furze unprofitably gay.
coat priest religion shoes
As I take my shoes from the shoemaker, and my coat from the tailor, so I take my religion from the priest
fond pursue
Too fond of the right to pursue the expedient.
fond former joys pain past recurring thou turning
O Memory, thou fond deceiver, Still importunate and vain, To former joys recurring ever, And turning all the past to pain
subject winds
Is he like Burke, who winds into a subject like a serpent?
defiance eye human lords pass pride
Pride in their port, defiance in their eye I see the Lords of human kind pass by.
copy improve model people seldom themselves
People seldom improve when they have no other model but themselves to copy after