Oliver Goldsmith Quotes

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The world may be considered as one vast mansion, where man has been admitted to enjoy, to admire, and to be grateful.

Oliver Goldsmith
All that philosophy can teach is to be stubborn or sullen under misfortunes.

Oliver Goldsmith
The volumes of antiquity, like medals, may very well serve to amuse the curious, but the works of the moderns, like the current coin of a kingdom, are much better for immediate use.

Oliver Goldsmith
There is probably no country so barbarous that would not disclose all it knew, if it received equivalent information; and I am apt to think that a person who was ready to give more knowledge than he received would be welcome wherever he came.

Oliver Goldsmith
I fancy the character of a poet is in every country the same,--fond of enjoying the present, careless of the future; his conversation that of a man of sense, his actions those of a fool.

Oliver Goldsmith
Every want that stimulates the breast becomes a source of pleasure when redressed.

Oliver Goldsmith
The wisdom of the ignorant somewhat resembles the instinct of animals; it is diffused in but a very narrow sphere, but within the circle it acts with vigor, uniformity, and success.

Oliver Goldsmith
Unequal combinations are always disadvantageous to the weaker side.

Oliver Goldsmith
As boys should be educated with temperance, so the first greatest lesson that should be taught them is to admire frugality. It is by the exercise of this virtue alone they can ever expect to be useful members of society.

Oliver Goldsmith
The folly of others is ever most ridiculous to those who are themselves most foolish.

Oliver Goldsmith
The work of eradicating crimes is not by making punishment familiar, but formidable.

Oliver Goldsmith
Nothing is so contemptible as that affectation of wisdom, which some display, by universal incredulity.

Oliver Goldsmith
Villainy, when detected, never gives up, but boldly adds impudence to imposture.

Oliver Goldsmith
Blame where you must, be candid where you can, And be each critic the Good-natured Man.

Oliver Goldsmith
I hate the French because they are all slaves and wear wooden shoes.

Oliver Goldsmith
If the soul be happily disposed, every thing becomes capable of affording entertainment, and distress will almost want a name.

Oliver Goldsmith
Ceremonies are different in every country, but true politeness is everywhere the same.

Oliver Goldsmith
No vernal blooms their torpid rocks array,
But winter lingering chills the lap of May;
No zephyr fondly sues the mountain's breast,
But meteors glare, and stormy glooms invest.

Oliver Goldsmith
A man's own heart must ever be given to gain that of another.

Oliver Goldsmith
The English laws punish vice; the Chinese laws do more, they reward virtue.

Oliver Goldsmith
Is it that Nature, attentive to the preservation of mankind, increases our wishes to live, while she lessens our enjoyments, and as she robs the senses of every pleasure, equips imag-ination in the spoil?

Oliver Goldsmith
Like the tiger, that seldom desists from pursuing man after having once preyed upon human flesh, the reader who has once gratified his appetite with calumny makes ever after the most agreeable feast upon murdered reputations!

Oliver Goldsmith
When any one of our relations was found to be a person of a very bad character, a troublesome guest, or one we desired to get rid of, upon his leaving my house I ever took care to lend him a riding-coat, or a pair of boots, or sometimes a horse of small value, and I always had the satisfaction of finding he never came back to return them.

Oliver Goldsmith
I have visited many countries, and have been in cities without number, yet never did I enter a town which could not produce ten or twelve little great men; all fancying themselves known to the rest of the world, and complimenting each other upon their extensive reputation.

Oliver Goldsmith
The person whose clothes are extremely fine I am too apt to consider as not being possessed of any superiority of fortune, but resembling those Indians who are found to wear all the gold they have in the world in a bob at the nose.

Oliver Goldsmith
See me, how calm I am.
Ay, people are generally calm at the misfortunes of others.

Oliver Goldsmith
Processions, cavalcades, and all that fund of gay frippery, furnished out by tailors, barbers, and tire-women, mechanically influence the mind into veneration; an emperor in his nightcap would not meet with half the respect of an emperor with a crown.

Oliver Goldsmith
Age, that lessens the enjoyment of life, increases our desire of living

Oliver Goldsmith
Quality and title have such allurements that hundreds are ready to give up all their own importance, to cringe, to flatter, to look little, and to pall every pleasure in constraint, merely to be among the great, though without the least hopes of improving their understanding or sharing their generosity. They might be happier among their equals.

Oliver Goldsmith
I can't say whether we had more wit among us now than usual, but I am certain we had more laughing, which answered the end as well.

Oliver Goldsmith