Quotes by Satirists - Page 4

All philosophies if you ride them home are nonsense but some are greater nonsense than others.
Samuel Butler
A man of business may talk of philosophy a man who has none may practise it.
Alexander Pope
Whoever thinks a faultless piece to see. Thinks what ne'er was nor is nor e'er shall be.
Alexander Pope
The greatest pleasure of a dog is that you may make a fool of yourself with him and not only will he not scold you but he will make a fool of himself too.
Samuel Butler
Peace: in international affairs a period of cheating between two periods of fighting.
Ambrose Bierce
The ruling passion be it what it will The ruling passion conquers reason still.
Alexander Pope
A picture is a poem without words.
Horace
Painting n: the art of protecting flat surfaces from the weather and exposing them to the critic.
Ambrose Bierce
He was a bold man that first ate an oyster.
Jonathan Swift
Fear is static that prevents me from hearing myself.
Samuel Butler
Pale death with impartial tread beats at the poor man's cottage door and at the palaces of kings.
Horace
Men would be angels angels would be gods.
Alexander Pope
In Rome you long for the country. In the country you praise to the skies the distant town.
Horace
No one is content with his own lot.
Horace
Order is Heaven's first law.
Alexander Pope
To be positive: to be mistaken at the top of one's voice.
Ambrose Bierce
What runs through a person like water through a sieve.
Samuel Butler
It is too bad if you have to do everything upon reflection and can't do anything from early habit.
Georg Christoph Lichtenberg
He possesses dominion over himself and is happy who can every day say "I have lived." Tomorrow the heavenly Father may either involve the world in dark clouds or cheer it with clear sunshine he will not however render ineffectual the things which have already taken place.
Horace
Live mindful of how brief your life is.
Horace
Gladly accept the gifts of the present hour.
Horace
May you live all the days of your life.
Jonathan Swift
The lower classes of men though they do not think it worthwhile to record what they perceive nevertheless perceive everything that is worth noting the difference between them and a man of learning often consists in nothing more than the latter's facility for expression.
G. C. Lichtenberg
An obstinate man does not hold opinions but they hold him.
Alexander Pope
Blessed be he who expects nothing for he shall never be disappointed.
Alexander Pope
How happy is the blameless vestal's lot! The world forgetting by the world forgot.
Alexander Pope
Thus let me live unseen unknown Thus unlamented let me die Steal from the world and not a stone Tell where I lie.
Alexander Pope
When your neighbor's house is afire your own property is at stake.
Horace
All gardening is landscape painting.
Alexander Pope
Light quirks of music broken and uneven Make the soul dance upon a jig to Heav'n.
Alexander Pope
The musician who always plays on the same string is laughed at.
Horace
Light quirks of music broken and uneven make the soul dance upon a jig of heaven.
Alexander Pope
I wish it I command it. Let my will take the place of a reason.
Juvenal
All progress is based upon a universal innate desire on the part of every living organism to live beyond its income.
Samuel Butler
Every man has his moral backside too which he doesn't expose unnecessarily but keeps covered as long as possible by the trousers of decorum.
G. C. Lichtenberg
All progress is based upon a universal innate desire on the part of every organism to live beyond its income.
Samuel Butler
When you have told anyone you have left him a legacy the only decent thing to do is to die at once.
Samuel Butler
Philanthropist: a rich (and usually bald) old gentleman who has trained himself to grin while his conscience is picking his pocket.
Ambrose Bierce
Eve left Adam to meet the Devil in private.
Alexander Pope
A sound mind in a sound body is a thing to be prayed for.
Juvenal
I reckon being ill is one of the greatest pleasures of life provided one is not too ill and is not obliged to work till one is better.
Samuel Butler
Sickness is a sort of early old age it teaches us a diffidence in our earthly state.
Alexander Pope
Marriage n: the state or condition of a community consisting of a master a mistress and two slaves making in all two.
Ambrose Bierce
Good manners is the art of making those people easy with whom we converse. Whoever makes the fewest persons uneasy is the best bred in the company.
Jonathan Swift
Know then thyself presume not God to scan The proper study of mankind is man.
Alexander Pope
Any fool can tell the truth but it requires a man of some sense to know how to lie well.
Samuel Butler
To live is like to love - all reason is against it and all healthy instinct for it.
Samuel Butler
What dire offence from am'rous causes springs. What mighty contests rise from trivial things.
Alexander Pope
Biography is one of the new terrors of death.
John Arbuthnot
A perfect judge will read each word of wit with the same spirit that its author writ.
Alexander Pope
May you live all the days of your life.
Jonathan Swift
Nature and Nature's laws lay hid in night: God said "Let Newton be!" and all was light.
Alexander Pope
Man unlike the animal has never learned that the sole purpose of life is to enjoy it.
Samuel Butler
Life is one long process of getting tired.
Samuel Butler
The vanity of human life is like a river constantly passing away and yet constantly coming on.
Alexander Pope
When the world has once begun to use us ill and afterwards continues the same treatment with less scruple or ceremony as men do to a whore.
Jonathan Swift
Life is like playing a violin in public and learning the instrument as one goes on.
Samuel Butler
St. Teresa of Avila described our life in this world as like a night at a second-class hotel.
Malcolm Muggeridge
Life is the art of drawing sufficient conclusions from insufficient premises.
Samuel Butler
St. Teresa of Avila described our life in this world as like a night in a second-class hotel.
Malcolm Muggeridge