For life, six hundred pounds a year;
A handsome house to lodge a friend;
A river at my garden's end;
A terrace walk, and half a rood
Of land set out to plant a wood." - Meaning and context.">
QuotesCosmos
Imitation of Horace, book ii. Sat. 6.; reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
“

I 've often wish'd that I had clear,
For life, six hundred pounds a year;
A handsome house to lodge a friend;
A river at my garden's end;
A terrace walk, and half a rood
Of land set out to plant a wood.

— Jonathan Swift

What It Means

This is a placeholder explanation generated by the low-overhead model. It interprets "I 've often wish'd that I had clear,
For life, six hundred pounds a year;
A handsome house to lodge a friend;
A river at my garden's end;
A terrace walk, and half a rood
Of land set out to plant a wood." in the context of "Imitation of Horace, book ii. Sat. 6.; reported in Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)" to mean that wisdom is timeless.

Source: Wikiquote: "Jonathan Swift" (Quotes) The 'What it means' explanation text was generated by Google Gemini Flash (accessed January 18, 2026). https://gemini.google.com/app

Tags

#Jonathan Swift#clearfor#handsome#hundred#frienda#gardens#terrace#pounds#roodof#often#wishd#yeara
Jonathan Swift

About Jonathan Swift

Jonathan Swift (30 November 1667 – 19 October 1745) was an Anglo-Irish writer and satirist. Acclaimed as one of the finest prose satirists in the English language, he was also well known for his poetry and essays.