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Very few men, properly speaking, live at present, but are providing to live another time.

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
Providing
Properly
Speaking
Present
Another
Live
Men
Time

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For in reason, all government without the consent of the governed is the very definition of slavery.
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For to enter the palace of learning at the great gate requires an expense of time and forms, therefore men of much haste and little ceremony are content to get in by the back-door
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I never saw, heard, nor read, that the clergy were beloved in any nation where Christianity was the religion of the country. Nothing can render them popular, but some degree of persecution.
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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.
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It is very unfair in any writer to employ ignorance and malice together, because it gives his answerer double work.
Jonathan Swift
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The best Maxim I know in this life is, to drink your Coffee when you can, and when you cannot, to be easy without it. While you continue to be splenetic, count upon it I will always preach. Thus much I sympathize with you that I am not cheerful enough to write, for I believe Coffee once a week is necessary to that.
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That incessant envy wherewith the common rate of mankind pursues all superior natures to their own.
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O Grub Street! how do I bemoan thee, whose graceless children scorn to own thee! . Yet thou hast greater cause to be ashamed of them, than they of thee.
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I wonder what fool it was that first invented kissing.
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She has more goodness in her little finger than he has in his whole body.
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What religion is he of? Why, he is an Anythingarian.
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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.
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Your onions should be thoroughly boiled.
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Desponding Phyllis was endu'd With ev'ry Talent of a Prude, She trembled when a Man drew near Salute her, and she turn'd her Ear: If o'er against her you were plac'd She durst not look above your Waist
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Had Windham possessed discretion in debate, or Sheridan in conduct, they might have ruled their age.
Jonathan Swift
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Sweeping from butcher's stalls, dung, guts, and blood, Drown'd puppies, stinking sprats, all drench'd in mud, Dead cats, and turnip-tops, come tumbling down the flood.
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When men grow virtuous in their old age, they only make a sacrifice to God of the devil's leavings.
Jonathan Swift
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No man will take counsel, but every man will take money. Therefore, money is better than counsel.
Jonathan Swift
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Politics, as the word is commonly understood, are nothing but corruptions.
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What poet would not grieve to see His brother write as well as he? But rather than they should excel, He'd wish his rivals all in Hell.
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