Quote

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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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
Food
Lakes
Lasts
Fishing
Last
Swim
Firsts
Fish
First
Fishes
Mind
Boat
Claret
Good
Rivers
Thrice
Sea
Butter

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Ah, a German and a genius ! A prodigy, admit him !
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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.
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The stoical scheme of supplying our wants by lopping off our desires, is like cutting off our feet when we want shoes.
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Although the devil be the father of lies, he seems, like other great inventors, to have lost much of his reputation by the continual improvements that have been made upon him.
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Arbitrary power is but the first natural step from anarchy, or the savage life.
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A wise man will find us to be rogues by our faces.
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Unjustly poets we asperse: Truth shines the brighter clad in verse, And all the fictions they pursue Do but insinuate what is true.
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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.
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Bread is the staff of life.
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I hate nobody: I am in charity with the world.
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There is no quality so contrary to any nature which one cannot affect, and put on upon occasion, in order to serve an interest.
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That was excellently observed’, say I, when I read a passage in an author, where his opinion agrees with mine. When we differ, there I pronounce him to be mistaken.
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Under the rose, since here are none but friends, To own the truth we have some private ends.
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Blot out, correct, insert, refine, enlarge, diminish, interline. Be mindful, when invention fails. To scratch your head and bite your nails.
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Fine words! I wonder where you stole them.
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One enemy can do more hurt than ten friends can do good.
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Hail fellow, well met.
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All panegyrics are mingled with an infusion of poppy.
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It is with wits as with razors, which are never so apt to cut those they are employed on as when they have lost their edge.
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All fits of pleasure are balanced by an equal degree of pain or languor it is like spending this year part of the next year's revenue.
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