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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.

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
Write
Rivals
Wells
Grieving
Well
Poet
Writing
Poetry
Would
Brother
Hell
Rather
Excel
Wish
Grieve

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We are so fond on one another because our ailments are the same.
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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
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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.
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It may pass for a maxim in State, that the administration cannot be placed in too few hands, nor the legislature in too many.
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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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Every man desires to live long, but no man wishes to be old.
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The two maxims of any great man at court are, always to keep his countenance, and never to keep his word.
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Careful observers may foretell the hour (By sure prognostics) when to dread a show'r. While rain depends, the pensive cat gives o'er Her frolics, and pursues her tail no more.
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A chuck under the chin is worth two kisses.
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Perpetual aiming at wit is a very bad part of conversation. It is done to support a character: it generally fails it is a sort of insult on the company, and a restraint upon the speaker.
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Vision is seeing the invisible.
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The tucked-up sempstress walks with hasty strides, While streams run down her oil'd umbrella's sides.
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If Heaven had looked upon riches to be a valuable thing, it would not have given them to such a scoundrel.
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There is nothing in this world constant, but inconstancy.
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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.
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I never wonder to see men wicked, but I often wonder to see them not ashamed.
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'T is an old maxim in the schools, That flattery 's the food of fools Yet now and then your men of wit Will condescend to take a bit.
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You cannot reason a person out of something they were not reasoned into.
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The first springs of great events, like those of great rivers, are often mean and little.
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If a man would register all his opinions upon love, politics, religion, learning etc., beginning from his youth, and so go to old age, what a bundle of inconsistencies and contradictions would appear at last.
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