William Congrevewas an English playwright and poet... (wikipedia)
If there's delight in love, 'Tis when I see that heart, which others bleed for, bleed for me.
Grief walks upon the heels of pleasure; married in haste, we repent at leisure.
Music has charms to sooth a savage breast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.
Say what you will, 'tis better to be left than never to have been loved.
Fear comes from uncertainty. When we are absolutely certain, whether of our worth or worthlessness, we are almost impervious to fear.
Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned, nor hell a fury like a woman scorned.
He who closes his ears to the views of others shows little confidence in the integrity of his own views.
Uncertainty and expectation are the joys of life. Security is an insipid thing.
Courtship is to marriage, as a very witty prologue to a very dull play.
You are a woman: you must never speak what you think; your words must contradict your thoughts, but your actions may contradict your words.
Wit must be foiled by wit: cut a diamond with a diamond.
A hungry wolf at all the herd will run, In hopes, through many, to make sure of one.
No, I'm no enemy to learning; it hurts not me.
There is in true beauty, as in courage, something which narrow souls cannot dare to admire.
I find we are growing serious, and then we are in great danger of being dull.
I confess freely to you, I could never look long upon a monkey, without very mortifying reflections.
Never go to bed angry, stay up and fight.
In my conscience I believe the baggage loves me, for she never speaks well of me herself, nor suffers any body else to rail at me.
A little disdain is not amiss; a little scorn is alluring.
She likes herself, yet others hates, For that which in herself she prizes; And while she laughs at them, forgets She is the thing that she despises.
I know that’s a secret, for it’s whispered everywhere.
They come together like the Coroner's Inquest, to sit upon the murdered reputations of the week.
Come, come, leave business to idlers, and wisdom to fools: they have need of 'em: wit be my faculty, and pleasure my occupation, and let father Time shake his glass.
'Tis well enough for a servant to be bred at an University. But the education is a little too pedantic for a gentleman.
They are at the end of the gallery; retired to their tea and scandal, according to their ancient custom.
Invention flags, his brain goes muddy, and black despair succeeds brown study.
To find a young fellow that is neither a wit in his own eye, nor a fool in the eye of the world, is a very hard task.
If this be not love, it is madness, and then it is pardonable.
A wit should be no more sincere than a woman constant.
There are come Critics so with Spleen diseased,They scarcely come inclining to be pleased:And sure he must have more than mortal Skill,Who please one against his Will.
Where modesty's ill manners, 'tis but fitThat impudence and malice pass for wit.
Yes, but tenderness becomes me best - a sort of dyingness - you see that picture has a sort of a - ha, Foible? A swimmingness in the eyes.
Would she could make of me a saint,Or I of her a sinner.
Wou'd I were free from this restraint, Or else had hopes to win her; Wou'd she cou'd make me a saint, Or I of her a sinner
Let us be very strange and well-bred: Let us be as strange as if we had been married a great while; and as well-bred as if we were not married at all.
She is chaste who was never asked the question
Nature, to each allots his proper Sphere, But, that forsaken, we like Comets err: Toss'd thro' the Void, by some rude Shock we're broke, And all our boasted Fire is lost in Smoke
Music hath charms to soothe a savage breast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.
Music has charms to soothe the savage beast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.
I came upstairs into the world; for I was born in a cellar.
Careless she is with artful care, / Affecting to seem unaffected.
Rise to meet him in a pretty disorder - yes- O, nothing is more alluring than a levee from a couch in some confusion.
Married in haste, we may repent at leisure.
Whom she refuses, she treats still / With so much sweet behaviour, / That her refusal, through her skill, / Looks almost like a favour.
Wife, spouse, my dear, joy, jewel, love, sweet-heart and the rest of that nauseous cant, in which men and their wives are so fulsomely familiar.
Tis well enough for a servant to be bred at an university: but the education is a little too pedantic for a gentleman.
There is in true beauty something which vulgar cannot admire
Well, Sir Joseph, you have such a winning way with you.
Women are like tricks by light of hand,Which, to admire, we should not understand.
Women are like tricks by light of hand, Which, to admire, we should not understand.
Uncertainty and expectation are the joys of life. Security is an insipid thing, through the overtaking and possessing of a wish discovers the folly of the chase.
Uncertainty and expectation are the joys of life.
Believe it, Men have ever been the same,And all the Golden Age is but a Dream.
Is he then dead? / What, dead at last, quite, quite for ever dead!
Defer not till to-morrow to be wise, To-morrow's sun to thee may never rise
A branch of one of your antediluvian families, fellows that the flood could not wash away.
Do not keep the alabaster boxes of your love and tenderness sealed up until your friends are dead. Fill their lives with sweetness, speak cheering words while their ears can hear, and while their hearts can be thrilled and made happier by them.
I hope you do not think me prone to an iteration of nuptials.
In hours of bliss we oft have met:They could not always last;And though the present I regret,I'm grateful for the past.
In hours of bliss we oft have met: They could not always last; And though the present I regret, I'm grateful for the past.
I know that's a secret, for it's whispered every where.
If I marry, Sir Sampson, I'm for a good estate with any man, and for any man with a good estate.
If I have not fretted myself till I am pale again, there's no veracity in me.
I could find it in my heart to marry thee, purely to be rid of thee.
I chiefly made it my own care to initiate her very infancy in the rudiments of virtue, and to impress upon her tender years a young odium and aversion to the very sight of men.
You were about to tell me something, child, but you left off before you began.
She once used me with that insolence, that in revenge I took her to pieces; sifted her, and separated her failings; I studied 'em, and got 'em by rote. The catalogue was so large, that I was not without hopes, one day or other to hate her heartily.
Honor is a public enemy, and conscience a domestic, and he that would secure his pleasure, must pay a tribute to one and go halves with t'other.
Thou art a retailer of phrases, and dost deal in remnants of remnants.
Turn pimp, flatterer, quack, lawyer, parson, be chaplain to an atheist, or stallion to an old woman, anything but a poet; for a poet is worse, more servile, timorous and fawning than any I have named.
All well bred persons lie – Besides, you are a woman; you must never speak what you think…
Hannibal was a very pretty fellow in those days.
Men are apt to offend ('tis true) where they find most goodness to forgive.
He that first cries out stop thief, is often he that has stolen the treasure.
I nauseate walking; 'tis a country diversion, I loathe the country.
O ay, letters - I had letters - I am persecuted with letters - I hate letters - nobody knows how to write letters; and yet one has 'em, one does not know why - they serve one to pin up one's hair.
If happiness in self-content is placed, The wise are wretched, and fools only blessed.
How hard a thing 'twould be to please you all.
It is the business of a comic poet to paint the vices and follies of human kind.
Love's but a frailty of the mind, When 'tis not with ambition joined.
Though marriage makes man and wife one flesh, it leaves 'em still two fools.
A wit should no more be sincere, than a woman constant; one argues a decay of parts, as to other of beauty.
I came up stairs into the world, for I was born in a cellar.
Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.
Every man plays the fool once in his live, but to marry is playing the fool all one's life long.
Some by experience find those words mis-placed: At leisure married, they repent in haste.
No mask like open truth to cover lies, As to go naked is the best disguise.
O fie, miss, you must not kiss and tell.
One minute gives invention to destroy; What to rebuild, will a whole age employ.
I always take blushing either for a sign of guilt, or of ill breeding.
Music has charms to soothe a savage breast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak. I've read that things inanimate have moved, and, as with living souls, have been inform'd, by magic numbers and persuasive sound.
Music alone with sudden charms can bind The wand'ring sense, and calm the troubled mind.
Whoever is king, is also the father of his country.
I hope you do not think me prone to any iteration of nuptials.
I am a fool, I know it; and yet, Heaven help me, I'm poor enough to be a wit.
Defer not till to-morrow to be wise, To-morrow's Sun to thee may never rise; Or should to-morrow chance to cheer thy sight With her enlivening and unlook'd for light, How grateful will appear her dawning rays! As favours unexpected doubly please.
To converse with Scandal is to play at Losing Loadum, you must lose a good name to him, before you can win it for yourself.
Who pleases one against his will.
I know a lady that loves to talk so incessantly, she won't give an echo fair play; she has that everlasting rotation of tongue that an echo must wait till she dies before it can catch her last words!
There are come Critics so with Spleen diseased, They scarcely come inclining to be pleased: And sure he must have more than mortal Skill, Who please one against his Will.