Jonathan Swift

"There is no talent so useful toward rising in the world, or which puts men more out of the reach of fortune, than that quality generally possessed by the dullest sort of men, and in common speech called discretion; a species of lower prudence, by the assistance of which, people of the meanest intellectuals, without any other qualification, pass through the world in great tranquillity, and with universal good treatment, neither giving nor taking offence."

3 likes

Source: Jonathan Swift (1856). “The Works of Jonathan Swift ...: Containing Interesting and Valuable Papers, Not Hitherto Published ... With Memoir of the Author”, p.206

About the author

Jonathan Swift

Jonathan Swift

Satirist, Writer

Jonathan Swift was an Irish writer and satirist, best known for his work 'Gulliver's Travels', which critiques human nature and society.

All quotes by Jonathan Swift →

Same author

More quotes by Jonathan Swift

See all →
Jonathan Swift Satirist, Writer

"That the universe was formed by a fortuitous concourse of atoms, I will no more believe than that the accidental jumbling of the alphabet would fall into a most ingenious treatise of philosophy."

Read quote