How is it possible to expect that mankind will take advice when they will not so much as take warning.
Jonathan SwiftRead
For in that universal call,_x000D_ _x000D_ Few bankers will to heaven be mounters;_x000D_ _x000D_ They'll cry, "Ye shops, upon us fall!_x000D_ _x000D_ Conceal and cover us, ye counters!_x000D_ _x000D_ When other hands the scales shall hold,_x000D_ _x000D_ And they, in men's and angels' sight_x000D_ _x000D_ Produced with all their bills and gold,_x000D_ _x000D_ 'Weigh'd in the balance and found light!'
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects on the folly of materialism and the judgment of one's true worth beyond wealth.
In this passage, Jonathan Swift critiques the prioritization of wealth and material possessions, emphasizing that when faced with ultimate judgment, the accumulation of riches will not hold significant value. He suggests that those who have focused solely on material gains will find themselves lacking when it comes to moral and spiritual weight, implying that true worth is not measured by monetary success but by one's virtues and contributions to humanity.
Themes
WealthJudgmentMaterialismMoral WorthRiches
In practice
Example use cases
This quote can be used in a speech about the importance of prioritizing values over wealth.
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
because it seemed too simple to accept that life was an act of faith.
Paulo CoelhoRead
What would life be like if everybody insisted you must have actually built such-and-such a thing by yourself? I'd be an old man and have nothing to show for the aging.
Ludwig Mies Van Der RoheRead
The meaning in life is not out there but inbetween our ears. In many ways this makes us the lords of creation.
Stephen HawkingRead
Through endless night the earth whirls toward a creation unknown.
Henry MillerRead
Religious doctrines … are all illusions, they do not admit of proof, and no one can be compelled to consider them as true or to believe in them.
Sigmund FreudRead
Accursed creator! Why did you form a monster so hideous that even you turned from me in disgust?
Mary Wollstonecraft ShelleyRead