How is it possible to expect that mankind will take advice when they will not so much as take warning.
Jonathan SwiftRead
The preaching of divines helps to preserve well-inclined men in the course of virtue, but seldom or ever reclaims the vicious.
Interpretation
What this quote means
Religion can guide good people, but it rarely changes those who are already inclined to do wrong.
In this quote, Jonathan Swift reflects on the effectiveness of religious teachings and moral guidance, suggesting that while such teachings may support and reinforce the behavior of virtuous individuals, they are often ineffective at changing the behavior of those who are already engaged in wrongdoing. This highlights the challenge of moral transformation and raises questions about the nature of personal change and the role of external guidance.
Themes
VirtueDivinesPreachingHuman NatureChange
In practice
Example use cases
In a sermon on morality, one could reference this quote to emphasize the limitations of religious guidance on those who have chosen a path of vice.
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.
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The bulk of mankind is as well equipped for flying as thinking.
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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
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