Jonathan Swift Quotes

Your thief looks Exactly like the rest, or rather better; 'Tis only at the bar, and in the dungeon, That wise men know your felon by his features.

A man who examines the saddle and bridle and not the animal itself when he is out to buy a horse is a fool; similarly, only an absolute fool values a man according to his clothes, or according to his position, which after all is only something we wear like clothing.

The habits of life form the soul, and the soul forms the countenance.

The superior man cannot be known in little matters, but he may be entrusted with great concerns. The small man may not be entrusted with great concerns, but he may be known in little matters.

An honest man you may form of windle-straws, but to make a rogue you must have grist.

The sober devil can hide his cloven hoof; but when the devil drinks he loses his cunning and grows honest.

You chose books, I chose looks . Now see the difference?

All my muscles are in my face. I have a very muscular face. I'm good with faces. I always have been.

Most people tend to think the best of those who are blessed with beauty; we have difficulty imagining that physical perfection can conceal twisted emotions or a damaged mind.

Just because someone's pretty, doesn't mean she's decent.

Men and women make their own beauty or their own ugliness. Sir Edward Bulwer Lytton speaks in one of his novels of a man "who was uglier than he had any business to be;" and, if we could but read it, every human being carries his life in his face, and is good-looking or the reverse as that life has been good or evil. On our features the fine chisels of thought and emotion are eternally at work.

Judge the moth by the beauty of the candle

His calumny is not only the greatest benefit a rogue can confer on us, but the only service he will perform for nothing.

The human face is, after all, nothing more nor less than a mask.

never judge anyone by their appearance, or the car they drive, or the house they live in, or even by the words they say. judge people by their actions. that's how you know whether they're bad or good." - perfect Summer

For every inch that is not fool, is rogue.

Garde-toi, tant que tu vivras, De juger des gens sur la mine. Beware as long as you live, Of judging others according to appearance alone.

...he'll never lie - the man is far too wise.

It is a mistake, too, to say that the face is the mirror of the soul. The truth is, men are very hard to know, and yet, not to be deceived, we must judge them by their present actions, but for the present only.

Faces are as legible as books, only with these circumstances to recommend them to our perusal, that they are read in much less time, and are much less likely to deceive us.

First impressions are often the truest, as we find (not unfrequently) to our cost when we have been wheedled out of them by plausible professions or actions. A man's look is the work of years, it is stamped on his countenance by the events of his whole life, nay, more, by the hand of nature, and it is not to be got rid of easily.

Every honest man will suppose honest acts to flow from honest principles, and the rogues may rail without intermission.

She studied him for a few more seconds. “You look too pretty to be useful.” I gasped in spite of myself. Adrian chuckled and shook her hand. “Truer words were never spoken,” he said.

A woman may possess the wisdom and chastity of Minerva, and we give no heed to her, if she has a plain face. What folly will not a pair of bright eyes make pardonable? What dullness may not red lips are sweet accents render pleasant? And so, with their usual sense of justice, ladies argue that because a woman is handsome, therefore she is a fool. O ladies, ladies! there are some of you who are neither handsome nor wise.

Virtue may not always make a Face handsome, but Vice will certainly make it ugly.