The Battle of the Books, and other Short Pieces

A party next of glittering dames, From round the purlieus of St. James, Came early, out of pure goodwill, To see the girl in deshabille. Their clamour 'lighting from their chair...

I will allow either of the two I have mentioned, or any other of the fraternity, to be not only astrologers, but conjurers too, if I do not produce a hundred instances in all th...

In the last place, I think nothing can be more plain, than that by this expedient we shall run into the evil we chiefly pretend to avoid; and that the abolishment of the Christi...

Then Aristotle, observing Bacon advance with a furious mien, drew his bow to the head, and let fly his arrow, which missed the valiant Modern and went whizzing over his head; bu...

I am very sensible what a weakness and presumption it is to reason against the general humour and disposition of the world. I remember it was with great justice, and a due regar...

Our wandering saints in woeful state, Treated at this ungodly rate, Having through all the village passed, To a small cottage came at last, Where dwelt a good honest old yeoman,...

As when a beauteous nymph decays, We say she's past her dancing days; So poets lose their feet by time, And can no longer dance in rhyme. Your annual bard had rather chose To ce...

Jonathan Swift was born in 1667, on the 30th of November. His father was a Jonathan Swift, sixth of the ten sons of the Rev. Thomas Swift, vicar of Goodrich, near Ross, in Heref...

While things were in this ferment, discord grew extremely high; hot words passed on both sides, and ill blood was plentifully bred. Here a solitary Ancient, squeezed up among a...

No preacher is listened to but Time, which gives us the same train and turn of thought that older people have tried in vain to put into our heads before.