Quote#World
It is a maxim among lawyers that whatever hath been done before may…
Quote byJonathan Swift · 1667–1745
Commonly attributed — not confirmed in an authoritative edition. Cited on Wikiquote to: Gulliver's Travels (1726), Part IV, Ch. 5.
English (original)
It is a maxim among lawyers that whatever hath been done before may be done again, and therefore they take special care to record all the decisions formerly made against common justice and the general reason of mankind. These, under the name of precedents, they produce as authorities to justify the most iniquitous opinions, and the judges never fail of directing them accordingly.
— Jonathan Swift
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Satire is a sort of glass, wherein beholders do generally discover everybody's face but their own.
Instead of dirt and poison we have rather chosen to fill our hives with honey and wax; thus furnishing mankind with the two noblest of things, which are sweetness and light.
Lord M. What religion is he of? Lord Sp. Why, he is an Anythingarian.
He was a bold man that first ate an oyster.
I mean you lie—under a mistake.
There are few, very few, that will own themselves in a mistake, though all the World sees them to be in downright nonsense.