523 Quotes by Oliver Goldsmith

Some fleeting good, that mocks me with the view.

We may affirm of Mr. Buffon, that which has been said of the chemists of old; though he may have failed in attaining his principal aim, of establishing a theory, yet he has brought together such a multitude of facts relative to the history of the earth, and the nature of its fossil productions, that curiosity finds ample compensation, even while it feels the want of conviction.

So the loud torrent, and the whirlwind's roar, But bind him to his native mountains more.

For just experience tells, in every soil, That those that think must govern those that toil.

The world is like a vast sea: mankind like a vessel sailing on its tempestuous bosom. ... [T]he sciences serve us for oars.

Our chief comforts often produce our greatest anxieties, and the increase in our possessions is but an inlet to new disquietudes.

Nobody with me at sea but myself.

[T]here are depths of thousands of miles which are hidden from our inquiry. The only tidings we have from those unfathomable regions are by means of volcanoes, those burning mountains that seem to discharge their materials from the lowest abysses of the earth.

A kind and gentle heart he had, To comfort friends and foes; The naked every day he clad When he put on his clothes.