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Wit generally succeeds more from being happily addressed than from its native poignancy. A jest, calculated to spread at a gaming-table, may be received with, perfect indifference should it happen to drop in a mackerel-boat.

Oliver Goldsmith

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Oliver Goldsmith
Age: 43 †
Born: 1730
Born: November 10
Died: 1774
Died: April 4
Dramaturge
Essayist
Literary Critic
Novelist
Physician
Physician Writer
Playwright
Poet
Polygraph
Theatrical Producer
Writer
Elphin
County Roscommon
Oliver Goldsmit
Doctor Goldsmith
Oliverio Goldsmith
Oliverus Goldsmith
Olver Goldsmith
Olivier Goldsmith
Dottor Golssmith
Tom Telescope
Solomon Winlove
James Willington
Author of the Vicar of Wakefield
Dr Goldsmith
Inspired Idiot
Succeed
Indifference
Gaming
Happen
Native
Addressed
Perfect
Drop
Jest
Happens
Boat
Calculated
May
Table
Succeeds
Tables
Happily
Generally
Wit
Mackerel
Spread
Received
Poignancy

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Friendship is made up of esteem and pleasure pity is composed of sorrow and contempt: the mind may for some time fluctuate between them, but it can never entertain both at once.
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The loud laugh that spoke the vacant mind.
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I always get the better when I argue alone.
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Ceremonies are different in every country, but true politeness is everywhere the same.
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Thou source of all my bliss and all my woe, That found'st me poor at first, and keep'st me so.
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Every acknowledgment of gratitude is a circumstance of humiliation and some are found to submit to frequent mortifications of this kind, proclaiming what obligations they owe, merely because they think it in some measure cancels the debt.
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There is nothing so absurd or ridiculous that has not at some time been said by some philosopher. Fontenelle says he would undertake to persuade the whole public of readers to believe that the sun was neither the cause of light or heat, if he could only get six philosophers on his side.
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If one wishes to become rich they must appear rich.
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Every want that stimulates the breast becomes a source of pleasure when redressed.
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While selfishness joins hands with no one of the virtues, benevolence is allied to them all.
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You, that are going to be married, think things can never be done too fast: but we that are old, and know what we are about, must elope methodically, madam.
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The greatest object in the universe, says a certain philosopher, is a good man struggling with adversity yet there is still a greater, which is the good man who comes to relieve it.
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Whatever the skill of any country may be in the sciences, it is from its excellence in polite learning alone that it must expect a character from posterity.
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They please, are pleas'd, they give to get esteem Till, seeming blest, they grow to what they seem.
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The first time I read an excellent book, it is to me just as if I had gained a new friend. When I read a book over I have perused before, it resembles the meeting with an old one.
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For the first time, the best may err, art may persuade, and novelty spread out its charms. The first fault is the child of simplicity but every other the offspring of guilt.
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What real good does an addition to a fortune already sufficient procure? Not any. Could the great man, by having his fortune increased, increase also his appetites, then precedence might be attended with real amusement.
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I do not love a man who is zealous for nothing.
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Of praise a mere glutton, he swallow'd what came, And the puff a dunce, he mistook it for fame Till his relish grown callous, almost to displease, Who pepper'd the highest was surest to please.
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As some tall cliff that lifts its awful form, Swells from the vale, and midway leaves the storm,- Though round its breast the rolling clouds are spread, Eternal sunshine settles on its head.
Oliver Goldsmith