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In oratory the greatest art is to hide art.

Jonathan Swift

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Jonathan Swift
Age: 77 †
Born: 1667
Born: November 30
Died: 1745
Died: October 19
Essayist
Human Rights Activist
Novelist
Opinion Journalist
Pamphleteer
Philosopher
Poet
Priest
Prosaist
Public Figure
Dublin city
Isaac Bickerstaff
M. B. Drapier
Lemuel Gulliver
Simon Wagstaff
Oratory
Hide
Greatest
Art

More quotes by Jonathan Swift

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This wine should be eaten, it is too good to be drunk.
Jonathan Swift
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They say fish should swim thrice * * * first it should swim in the sea (do you mind me?) then it should swim in butter, and at last, sirrah, it should swim in good claret.
Jonathan Swift
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A true critic, in the perusal of a book, is like a dog at a feast, whose thoughts and stomach are wholly set upon what the guests fling away, and consequently is apt to snarl most when there are the fewest bones.
Jonathan Swift
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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
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Vision is the Art of seeing Things invisible.
Jonathan Swift
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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.
Jonathan Swift
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I wonder what fool it was that first invented kissing.
Jonathan Swift
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Pray steal me not, I'm Mrs. Dingley's, Whose heart in this four-footed thing lies.
Jonathan Swift
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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
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It is useless to attempt to reason a man out of a thing he was never reasoned into.
Jonathan Swift
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This Day, whate'er the Fates decree Shall still be kept with Joy by me: This Day then, let us not be told, That you are sick, and I grown old
Jonathan Swift
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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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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
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Some dire misfortune to portend, no enemy can match a friend.
Jonathan Swift
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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.
Jonathan Swift
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The affectation of some late authors to introduce and multiply cant words is the most ruinous corruption in any language.
Jonathan Swift
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She wears her clothes as if they were thrown on with a pitchfork.
Jonathan Swift
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What religion is he of? Why, he is an Anythingarian.
Jonathan Swift
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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
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I never knew any man cured of inattention.
Jonathan Swift