Oliver Goldsmith

The jests of the rich are ever successful.

Girls like to be played with, and rumpled a little too, sometimes.

Could a man live by it, it were not unpleasant employment to be a poet.

There are some faults so nearly allied to excellence that we can scarce weed out the vice without eradicating the virtue.

Surely the best way to meet the enemy is head on in the field and not wait till they plunder our very homes.

The hours we pass with happy prospects in view are more pleasing than those crowded with fruition.

Honour sinks where commerce long prevails.

Write how you want, the critic shall show the world you could have written better.

Modesty seldom resides in a breast that is not enriched with nobler virtues.

With disadvantages enough to bring him to humility, a Scotsman is one of the proudest things alive.

Man wants but little here below, nor wants that little long.

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

When lovely woman stoops to folly, and finds too late that men betray, what charm can soothe her melancholy, what art can wash her guilt away?

If you were to make little fishes talk, they would talk like whales.

They say women and music should never be dated.

People seldom improve when they have no other model but themselves to copy.

Tenderness is a virtue.

Every absurdity has a champion to defend it.

On the stage he was natural, simple, affecting, 'Twas only when he was off, he was acting.

Law grinds the poor, and rich men rule the law.