A great source of calamity lies in regret and anticipation; therefore a person is wise who thinks of the present alone, regardless of the past or future.
Oliver Goldsmith

A man who leaves home to mend himself and others is a philosopher; but he who goes from country to country, guided by the blind impulse of curiosity, is a vagabond.
Oliver Goldsmith

All that a husband or wife really wants is to be pitied a little, praised a little, and appreciated a little.
Oliver Goldsmith

As writers become more numerous, it is natural for readers to become more indolent; whence must necessarily arise a desire of attaining knowledge with the greatest possible ease.
Oliver Goldsmith

Be not affronted at a joke. If one throw salt at thee, thou wilt receive no harm, unless thou art raw.
Oliver Goldsmith

Ceremonies are different in every country, but true politeness is everywhere the same.
Oliver Goldsmith

Conscience is a coward, and those faults it has not strength enough to prevent it seldom has justice enough to accuse.
Oliver Goldsmith

Could a man live by it, it were not unpleasant employment to be a poet.
Oliver Goldsmith

Every absurdity has a champion to defend it.
Oliver Goldsmith

Friendship is a disinterested commerce between equals; love, an abject intercourse between tyrants and slaves.
Oliver Goldsmith

Girls like to be played with, and rumpled a little too, sometimes.
Oliver Goldsmith

Honour sinks where commerce long prevails.
Oliver Goldsmith

Hope is such a bait, it covers any hook.
Oliver Goldsmith

I chose my wife, as she did her wedding gown, for qualities that would wear well.
Oliver Goldsmith

I love everything that's old, - old friends, old times, old manners, old books, old wine.
Oliver Goldsmith

I was ever of the opinion, that the honest man who married and brought up a large family, did more service than he who continued single, and only talked of population.
Oliver Goldsmith

If you were to make little fishes talk, they would talk like whales.
Oliver Goldsmith

Law grinds the poor, and rich men rule the law.
Oliver Goldsmith

Let schoolmasters puzzle their brain, With grammar, and nonsense, and learning, Good liquor, I stoutly maintain, Gives genius a better discerning.
Oliver Goldsmith

Life is a journey that must be traveled no matter how bad the roads and accommodations.
Oliver Goldsmith