Top 100 Jonathan Swift Quotes
#1. 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
#3. In all assemblies, though you wedge them ever so close, we may observe this peculiar property, that over their heads there is room enough; but how to reach it is the difficult point. To this end the philosopher's way in all ages has been by erecting certain edifices in the air.
Jonathan Swift
#5. 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
#6. As love without esteem is capricious and volatile; esteem without love is languid and cold.
Jonathan Swift
#7. From not the gravest of Divines,
Accept for once some serious Lines.
Jonathan Swift
#8. I forget whether advice be among the lost things which Ariosto says are to be found in the moon: that and time ought to have been there.
Jonathan Swift
#9. A prince, the moment he is crown'd,
Inherits every virtue sound,
As emblems of the sovereign power,
Like other baubles in the Tower:
Is generous, valiant, just, and wise,
And so continues till he dies.
Jonathan Swift
#10. 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
#11. When we desire or solicit anything, our minds run wholly on the good side or circumstances of it; when it is obtained, our minds run wholly on the bad ones.
Jonathan Swift
#12. Seamen have a custom, when they meet a whale, to fling him out an empty tub by way of amusement, to divert him from laying violent hands upon the ship.
Jonathan Swift
#13. What religion is he of?
Why, he is an Anythingarian.
Jonathan Swift
#14. Positiveness is a good quality for preachers and speakers because, whoever shares his thoughts with the public will convince them as he himself appears convinced.
Jonathan Swift
#16. 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 of each other.
Jonathan Swift
#17. Great abilities, when employed as God directs, do but make the owners of them greater and more painful servants to their neighbors.
Jonathan Swift
#18. 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.
Jonathan Swift
#19. A forward critic often dupes us With sham quotations peri hupsos, And if we have not read Longinus, Will magisterially outshine us. Then, lest with Greek he over-run ye, Procure the book for love or money, Translated from Boileau's translation, And quote quotation on quotation.
Jonathan Swift
#20. Most sorts of diversion in men, children and other animals, are in imitation of fighting.
Jonathan Swift
#21. 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
#22. Laws are like cobwebs, which may catch small flies, but let wasps and hornets break through.
Jonathan Swift
#23. So geographers, in Africa maps, With savage pictures fill their gaps, And o'er uninhabitable downs Place elephants for want of towns
Jonathan Swift
#24. All disgracers of the press in prose and verse condemned to eat nothing but their own cotton, and quench their thirst with their own ink.
Jonathan Swift
#26. Had Windham possessed discretion in debate, or Sheridan in conduct, they might have ruled their age.
Jonathan Swift
#27. Silks, velvets, calicoes, and the whole lexicon of female fopperies.
Jonathan Swift
#28. Very few men, properly speaking, live at present, but are providing to live another time.
Jonathan Swift
#29. Power is no blessing in itself, except when it is used to protect the innocent.
Jonathan Swift
#31. Nothing is so hard for those who abound in riches as to conceive how others can be in want.
Jonathan Swift
#32. I used to wonder how a man of birth and spirit could endure to be wholly insignificant and obscure in a foreign country, when he might live with lustre in his own.
Jonathan Swift
#33. Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed.
Jonathan Swift
#36. I have heard of a man who had a mind to sell his house, and therefore carried a piece of brick in his pocket, which he shewed as a pattern to encourage purchasers.
Jonathan Swift
#37. The chameleon, who is said to feed upon nothing but air, has of all animals the nimblest tongue.
Jonathan Swift
#38. If a man makes me keep my distance, the comfort is, he keeps his at the same time.
Jonathan Swift
#39. The tucked-up sempstress walks with hasty strides, While streams run down her oil'd umbrella's sides.
Jonathan Swift
#40. In men desire begets love, and in women love begets desire.
Jonathan Swift
#42. The bulk of mankind is as well equipped for flying as thinking.
Jonathan Swift
#43. Strange an astrologer should die, without one wonder in the sky.
Jonathan Swift
#44. Nothing is so great an example of bad manners as flattery. If you flatter all the company, you please none; If you flatter only one or two, you offend the rest.
Jonathan Swift
#45. I never knew a man come to greatness or eminence who lay abed late in the morning.
Jonathan Swift
#47. The various opinions of philosophers have scattered through the world as many plagues of the mind as Pandora's box did those of the body; only with this difference, that they have not left hope at the bottom.
Jonathan Swift
#49. A footman may swear; but he cannot swear like a lord. He can swear as often: but can he swear with equal delicacy, propriety, and judgment?
Jonathan Swift
#50. The stoical scheme of supplying our wants by lopping off our desires, is like cutting off our feet, when we want shoes.
Jonathan Swift
#51. 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
#52. Men who possess all the advantages of life are in a state where there are many accidents to disorder and discompose, but few to please them.
Jonathan Swift
#53. 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
#54. She wears her clothes as if they were thrown on with a pitchfork.
Jonathan Swift
#56. Love why do we one passion call,
When 'tis a compound of them all?
Where hot and cold, where sharp and sweet,
In all their equipages meet;
Where pleasures mix'd with pains appear,
Sorrow with joy, and hope with fear.
Jonathan Swift
#57. Abstracts, abridgments, summaries, etc., have the same use with burning-glasses,
to collect the diffused light rays of wit and learning in authors, and make them point with warmth and quickness upon the reader's imagination.
Jonathan Swift
#59. 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
#60. Good manners is the art of making those people easy with whom we converse. Whoever makes the fewest people uneasy is the best bred in the room.
Jonathan Swift
#61. A wise man is never less alone than when he is alone.
Jonathan Swift
#62. He that calls a man ungrateful sums up all the veil that a man can be guilty of.
Jonathan Swift
#63. My nose itched, and I knew I should drink wine or kiss a fool.
Jonathan Swift
#64. When men grow virtuous in their old age, they only make a sacrifice to God of the devil's leavings.
Jonathan Swift
#65. Take a strict view of their excrements, and, from the colour, the odour, the taste, the consistence, the crudeness or maturity of digestion, form a judgment of their thoughts and designs; because men are never so serious, thoughtful, and intent, as when they are at stool ...
Jonathan Swift
#66. The system of morality to be gathered from the ancient sages falls very short of that delivered in the gospel.
Jonathan Swift
#67. To acknowledge you were wrong yesterday is simply to let the world know that you are wiser today than you were then.
Jonathan Swift
#68. Quotations are best brought in to confirm some opinion controverted.
Jonathan Swift
#69. I wonder what fool it was that first invented kissing.
Jonathan Swift
#70. 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
#71. By candle-light nobody would have taken you for above five-and-twenty.
Jonathan Swift
#72. Whence proceeds this weight we lay
On what detracting people say?
Their utmost malice cannot make
Your head, or tooth, or finger ache;
Nor spoil your shapes, distort your face,
Or put one feature out of place.
Jonathan Swift
#73. It is the talent of human nature to run from one extreme to another.
Jonathan Swift
#75. There is no vice which humankind carries to such wild extremes as that of avarice.
Jonathan Swift
#76. It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into.
Jonathan Swift
#77. Complaint is the largest tribute heaven receives and the sincerest part of our devotion.
Jonathan Swift
#78. My Lawyer being practiced almost from his Cradle in defending Falsehood; is quite out of his Element when he would be an Advocate for Justice, which as an Office unnatural, he always attempts with great Awkwardness if not with Ill-will.
Jonathan Swift
#79. Wise people are never less alone than when they are alone.
Jonathan Swift
#80. With a whirl of thought oppressed
I sink from reverie to rest.
An horrid vision seized my head,
I saw the graves give up their dead.
Jonathan Swift
#81. Principally I hate and detest that animal called man; although I heartily love John, Peter, Thomas, and so forth.
Jonathan Swift
#82. That his majesty gave many marks of his great lenity, often
Jonathan Swift
#84. Under the rose, since here are none but friends, To own the truth we have some private ends.
Jonathan Swift
#85. 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
#86. And surely one of the best rules in conversation is, never to say a thing which any of the company can reasonably wish had been left unsaid ...
Jonathan Swift
#87. If a lump of soot falls into the soup and you cannot conveniently get it out, stir it well in and it will give the soup a French taste.
Jonathan Swift
#88. Happiness is the perpetual possession of being well deceived.
Jonathan Swift
#89. It may pass for a maxim in State, that the administration cannot be placed in too few hands, nor the legislature in too many.
Jonathan Swift
#90. The ruin of a State is generally preceded by an universal degeneracy of manners and contempt of religion.
Jonathan Swift
#91. Interest is the spur of the people, but glory that of great souls. Invention is the talent of youth, and judgment of age.
Jonathan Swift
#92. Fools are apt to imitate only the defects of their betters.
Jonathan Swift
#93. Some dire misfortune to portend, no enemy can match a friend.
Jonathan Swift
#94. Invention is the talent of youth, as judgment is of age.
Jonathan Swift
#95. There never appear more than five or six men of genius in an age, but if they were united the world could not stand before them.
Jonathan Swift
#98. 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
#100. Small causes are sufficient to make a man uneasy, when great ones are not in the way: for want of a block he will stumble at a straw.
Jonathan Swift
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