Quotes & anectdotes from
the wise,
the foolish,
the courageous &
the drunk

Oliver Goldsmith Novelist

  • Gender: Male
  • Citizenship: Kingdom of Ireland
  • Born: Nov 10, 1730
  • Died: Apr 4, 1774

Oliver Goldsmith was an Anglo-Irish novelist, playwright and poet, who is best known for his novel The Vicar of Wakefield, his pastoral poem The Deserted Village, and his plays The Good-Natur'd Man and She Stoops to Conquer. He also wrote An History of the Earth and Animated Nature. He is thought to have written the classic children's tale The History of Little Goody Two-Shoes, the source of the phrase "goody two-shoes".

Hope is such a bait, it covers any hook.

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

Success consists of getting up just one more time than you fall.

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

The company of fools may first make us smile, but in the end we always feel melancholy.

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

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

Pity and friendship are two passions incompatible with each other.