How is it possible to expect that mankind will take advice when they will not so much as take warning.
Jonathan SwiftRead
If a man makes me keep my distance, the comfort is, he keeps his at the same time.
Interpretation
What this quote means
This quote highlights the mutual nature of distance in relationships; if one person maintains distance, the other can feel reassured that the feeling is reciprocated.
Jonathan Swift's quote reflects on the dynamics of personal relationships, suggesting that when one individual chooses to keep their distance, it often implies that this distance is mutual. This can provide comfort to the one affected, as it indicates that they are not alone in their feelings of separation, underscoring a shared experience of emotional space.
Themes
DistanceRelationshipsMutualityComfortSeparation
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used during a speech about personal boundaries in relationships.
More from Jonathan Swift
All quotes →What vexes me most is, that my female friends, who could bear me very well a dozen years ago, have now forsaken me, although I am not so old in proportion to them as I formerly was: which I can prove by arithmetic, for then I was double their age, which now I am not. Letter to Alexander Pope. 7 Feb. 1736.
Jonathan SwiftRead
This is every cook's opinion - _x000D_ no savory dish without an onion, _x000D_ but lest your kissing should be spoiled _x000D_ your onions must be fully boiled.
Jonathan SwiftRead
The bulk of mankind is as well equipped for flying as thinking.
Jonathan SwiftRead
This single Stick, which you now behold ingloriously lying in that neglected Corner, I once knew in a flourishing State in a Forest: It was full of Sap, full of Leaves, and full of Boughs: But now, in vain does the busy Art of Man pretend to vie with Nature, by tying that withered Bundle of Twigs to its sapless Trunk: It is at best but the Reverse of what it was; a Tree turned upside down, the Branches on the Earth, and the Root in the Air.
Jonathan SwiftRead
I'm as old as my tongue and a little older than my teeth.
Jonathan SwiftRead
Similar quotes
If you know someone who’s depressed, please resolve never to ask them why. Depression isn’t a straightforward response to a bad situation; depression just is, like the weather. Try to understand the blackness, lethargy, hopelessness, and loneliness they’re going through. Be there for them when they come through the other side. It’s hard to be a friend to someone who’s depressed, but it is one of the kindest, noblest, and best things you will ever do.
Stephen FryRead
As a child, I heard in my home doctors and ambulance men say, 'Mrs. Stewart, you must've done something to provoke him.' 'Mrs. Stewart, it takes two to make an argument.' Wrong. Wrong! My mother did nothing to provoke that - and even if she had, violence is never ever a choice that a man should make. Ever.
Patrick StewartRead
She could see that to lose a sibling was hard: it could only seem unnatural:out of time, out of order, a vicious re-run of your own departure into nothingness.
Fay WeldonRead
Of all the actions of a man's life, his marriage does least concern other people, yet of all the actions of our lives, 'tis the most meddled with by other people.
John SeldenRead
All advocacy is, at its core, an exercise in empathy.
Samantha PowerRead
If you would marry suitably, marry your equal.
OvidRead