Jonathan Swift Quotes

I love to engage in repartee with people who are stupider than I am.

No man would listen to you talk if he didn't know it was his turn next.

The telephone, which interrupts the most serious conversations and cuts short the most weighty observations, has a romance of its own.

In the first 20 seconds of talking, your light is green: your listener is liking you as long as your statement is relevant to the conversation and, hopefully, in service of the other person. But unless you are an extremely gifted raconteur, people who talk for more than roughly half a minute at a time are boring and often perceived as too chatty.

Don't take up a man's time talking about the smartness of your children; he wants to talk to you about the smartness of his children.

It is an impertinent and unreasonable fault in conversation for one man to take up all the discourse.

I'm that person in the bar who's like, "Can they turn the music down? I would like to chat."

If the word is not dead when it reaches the hearer, he murders it at once by a contradiction, a stipulation, a condition, a digression, an interruption, and all the thousand tricks of conversation.

When a friend calls to me from the road And slows his horse to a meaning walk, I don't stand still and look around On all the hills I haven't hoed, And shout from where I am, What is it? No, not as there is a time to talk. I thrust my hoe in the mellow ground, Blade-end up and five feet tall, And plod: I go up to the stone wall For a friendly visit.

Unconsciously we seek the principles and opinions which are suited to our temperament, so that at last it seems as if these principles and opinions had formed our character and given it support and stability.

Matthew, much to his own surprise, was enjoying himself. Like most quiet folks he liked talkative people when they were willing to do the talking themselves and did not expect him to keep up his end of it.

Living authors, therefore, are usually, bad companions. If they have not gained character, they seek to do so by methods often ridiculous, always disgusting; and if they have established a character, they are silent for fear of losing by their tongue what they have acquired by their pen--for many authors converse much more foolishly than Goldsmith, who have never written half so well.

Table talk, to be perfect, should be sincere without bigotry, differing without discord, sometimes grave, always agreeable, touching on deep points, dwelling most on seasonable ones, and letting everybody speak and be heard.

Courtesy is the due of man to man; not of suit-of-clothes to suit-of-clothes.

I thought I'd pay you a visit, my dear. Since you're so interesting." My mouth shifted into high gear, leaving my brain behind. "You know, you're the second guy in a few days to call me that. You should be more creative.

God uses his Word, people and circumstances to mold us. All three are indispensable for character development. God's word provides the truth we need to grow, God's people provide the support we need to grow, and circumstances provide the environment we need to grow.

While I wanted to be supportive of Kanye [west] on the phone call, you cannot 'approve' a song you haven't heard. Being falsely painted as a liar when I was never given the full story or played any part of the song is character assassination.

Some guys like to talk. What's the problem with that?

I realized that the people weren't just characters but they were people and they were getting to do something that was so fun and I wanted to be a part of it.

The love and support from the Witches of East End fans continues to blow us away and renews our faith that storytelling matters, strong female characters matter, and messages about faith and hope matter. I love this family. I love this story. And to be part of a show that has inspired and touched so many people's hearts is a true blessing.

They are a very decent generous lot of people out here and they don't expect you to listen.... It's the secret of social ease in this country. They talk entirely for their own pleasure. Nothing they say is designed to be heard.

You don't have ideas when you're sitting in that sort of sterile little place, and you're not around people. The most boring scenes are the scenes where a character is alone. I just need that dynamic of other people around me to get my work done.

Whenever I have talked to anyone at too great length, I am like a man who has drunk too much, and ashamed, doesn't know where to put himself.

We must support our rights or lose our character, and with it, perhaps, our liberties.

People do not seem to talk for the sake of expressing their opinions, but to maintain an opinion for the sake of talking.