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Satire55 quotes
All is for the best in the best of all possible worlds. — Voltaire · 1759If this is the best of possible worlds, what then are the others? — Voltaire · 1759I have wanted to kill myself a hundred times, but somehow I am still in love with life. This ridiculous weakness is perhaps one of our more stupid melancholy propensities, for is there anything more stupid than to be eager to go on carrying a burden which one would gladly throw away, to loathe one’s very being and yet to hold it fast, to fondle the snake that devours us until it has eaten our hearts away? — Voltaire · 1759Great wits are sure to madness near allied
And thin partitions do their bounds divide. — John Dryden · 1681For who can be secure of private right,
If sovereign sway may be dissolved by might?
Nor is the people's judgement always true:
The most may err as grossly as the few. — John Dryden · 1681Speak the truth and shame the Devil. — Francois Rabelais · 1564All 55 quotes →Travel writing6 quotes
Men are never so serious, thoughtful, and intent as when they are at stool. — Jonathan Swift · 1726He had been eight years upon a project for extracting sunbeams out of cucumbers, which were to be put into vials hermetically sealed, and let out to warm the air in raw inclement summers. — Jonathan Swift · 1726I said there was a society of men among us bred up from their youth in the art of proving by words multiplied for the purpose that white is black and black is white, according as they are paid. To this society all the rest of the people are slaves. — Jonathan Swift · 1726They will never allow that a child is under any obligation to his father for begetting him, or his mother for bringing him into the world - which, considering the miseries of human life, was neither a benefit in itself nor intended so by his parents, whose thoughts in their love encounters were otherwise employed. — Jonathan Swift · 1726Whoever could make two ears of corn or two blades of grass to grow upon a spot of ground where only one grew before would deserve better of mankind and do more essential service to his country than the whole race of politicians put together. — Jonathan Swift · 1726I cannot but conclude the bulk of your natives to be the most pernicious race of little odious vermin that Nature ever suffered to crawl upon the surface of the earth. — Jonathan Swift · 1726Political literature3 quotes
They wonder much to hear that gold, which in itself is so useless a thing, should be everywhere so much esteemed, that even men for whom it was made, and by whom it has its value, should yet be thought of less value than it is. — Thomas More · 1516They have no lawyers among them, for they consider them as a sort of people whose profession it is to disguise matters. — Thomas More · 1516Anyone who campaigns for public office becomes disqualified for holding any office at all. — Thomas More · 1516Satire (play)3 quotes
Certainly nothing is unnatural that is not physically impossible. — Richard Brinsley Sheridan · 1779The number of those who undergo the fatigue of judging for themselves is very small indeed. — Richard Brinsley Sheridan · 1779There is not a passion so strongly rooted in the human heart as envy. — Richard Brinsley Sheridan · 1779Satirical fiction2 quotes
Speak the truth and shame the Devil. — Francois Rabelais · 1564To laugh is proper to man. — Francois Rabelais · 1534Comedy1 quote
There shall be no love lost. — Ben Jonson · 1599Comedy (play)1 quote
There shall be no love lost. — Ben Jonson · 1599Drama1 quote
Everyone has their reasons. — Octave · 1939Drama (film)1 quote
Everyone has their reasons. — Octave · 1939Drama (play)1 quote
People are always blaming their circumstances for what they are. I don't believe in circumstances. The people who get on in this world are the people who get up and look for the circumstances they want, and, if they can't find them, make them. — George Bernard Shaw · 1898Horror1 quote
It's so hard to forget pain, but it's even harder to remember sweetness. We have no scar to show for happiness. We learn so little from peace. — Chuck Palahniuk · 2003Satire (film)1 quote
Everyone has their reasons. — Octave · 1939