Great Throughts Treasury

"If a daughter you have, she's the plague of your life, no peace shall you know though you've buried your wife! At twenty she mocks at the duty you taught her-- Oh, what a plague is an obstinate daughter!"

"If I reprehend anything in this world, it is the use of my oracular tongue, and a nice derangement of epitaphs!"

"If Parliament were to consider the sporting with reputation of as much importance as sporting on manors, and pass an act for the preservation of fame as well as game, there are many who would thank them for the bill."

"If the thought is slow to come, a glass of good wine encourages it; and when it does come, a glass of good wine rewards it."

"Illiterate him, I say, quite from your memory."

"Illiterate him, I say, quite from your memory.... There is nothing on earth so easy as to forget, if a person chooses to set about it. I'm sure I have as much forgot your poor, dear uncle, as if he had never existed?and I thought it my duty to do so."

"I'm called away by particular business. But I leave my character behind me."

"In all cases of slander currency, whenever the forger of the lie is not to be found, the injured parties should have a right to come on any of the indorsers."

"In religion, as in friendship, they who profess most are ever the least sincere."

"Inconsolable to the minuet in Ariadne."

"Is she not a wilderness of faults and follies?"

"It is by women that nature writes on the hearts of men."

"It was an amiable weakness."

"Madam, a circulating library in a town is as an evergreen tree of diabolical knowledge; it blossoms through the year. And depend on it ... that they who are so fond of handling the leaves, will long for the fruit at last."

"Many a wretch had rid on a hurdle who has done much less mischief than utterers of forged tales, coiners of scandal, and clippers of reputation."

"Men seldom think deeply on subjects in which they have no choice of opinion: they are fearful of encountering obstacles to their faith--as in religion--and so are content with the surface."

"My valor is certainly going! ? it is sneaking off! I feel it oozing out, as it were, at the palm of my hands!"

"Nay, but Jack, such eyes! such eyes! so innocently wild! so bashfully irresolute! Not a glance but speaks and kindles some thought of love! Then, Jack, her cheeks! her cheeks, Jack! so deeply blushing at the insinuations of her tell-tale eyes! Then, Jack, her lips! O, Jack, lips smiling at their own discretion! and, if not smiling, more sweetly pouting?more lovely in sullenness! Then, Jack, her neck! O, Jack, Jack!"

"No caparisons, miss, if you please. Caparisons don't become a young woman."

"No one, says Jerome, loves to tell a tale of scandal except to him who loves to hear it. Learn, then, to rebuke and check the detracting tongue by showing that you do not listen to it with pleasure. Never make your ear the grave of another's good name."

"No scandal about Queen Elizabeth, I hope?"

"Nothing keeps me in such awe as perfect beauty; now, there is something consoling and encouraging in ugliness."

"One moral's plain . . . without more fuss; man's social happiness all rests on us: through all the drama--whether damn'd or not-- Love gilds the scene, and women guide the plot."

"Our memories are independent of our wills. It is not so easy to forget."

"Prudence, like experience, must be paid for."

"Satires and lampoons on particular people circulate more by giving copies in confidence to the friends of the parties, than by printing them."

"Sheer necessity--the proper parent of an art so nearly allied to invention."

"Soft pity never leaves the gentle breast where love has been received a welcome guest."

"Steal! to be sure they may, and, egad, serve your best thoughts as gipsies do stolen children - disfigure them to make them pass for their own."

"Such protection as vultures give to lambs."

"Sure if I reprehend anything in this world, it is the use of my oracular tongue, and a nice derangement of epitaphs."

"Take care; you know I am compliance itself, when I am not thwarted! No one more easily led, when I have my own way; but don't put me in a phrenzy."

"Tale bearers are just as bad as tale makers."

"Tale-bearers, as I said before, are just as bad as the tale-makers."

"That's too civil by half."

"The argument of the weak."

"The newspapers! Sir, they are the most villainous ? licentious ? abominable ? infernal ? Not that I ever read them ? no ? I make it a rule never to look into a newspaper."

"The Right Honorable gentleman is indebted to his memory for his jests and to his imagination for his facts."

"The Spanish fleet thou canst not see, because?it is not yet in sight!"

"There are a set of malicious, prating, prudent gossips, both male and female, who murder characters to kill time; and will rob a young fellow of his good name before he has years to know the value of it."

"There's no possibility of being witty without a little ill-nature; the malice of a good thing is the barb that makes it stick."

"There's nothing like being used to a thing."

"There's no possibility of being witty without a little ill-nature? The malice of a good thing is the barb that makes it stick."

"They only babble who practise not reflection. - I shall think; and thought is silence."

"They only have lived long who have lived virtuously."

"This bottle's the sun of our table, his beams are rosy wine; we planets that are not able without his held to shine."

"Though sinking in decrepit age, he prematurely falls whose memory records no benefit conferred on him by man. They only have lived long who have lived virtuously."

"Thought is silence."

"Through all the drama ? whether damned or not ? Love gilds the scene, and women guide the plot."

"Too civil by half."