Top 92 William Congreve Quotes

#1. A wit should be no more sincere than a woman constant.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #38804
#2. Courtship is to marriage, as a very witty prologue to a very dull play.
(quoted in Life After Life)

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #44959
#3. A little scorn is alluring.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #69121
#4. I confess freely to you, I could never look long upon a monkey, without very mortifying reflections.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #72028
#5. There is in true beauty, as in courage, something which narrow souls cannot dare to admire.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #73500
#6. Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned, nor hell a fury like a woman scorned.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #88544
#7. Love's but the frailty of the mind, When 'tis not with ambition joined; A sickly flame, which if not fed expires; And feeding, wastes in self-consuming fires.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #137664
#8. One no more owes one's beauty to a lover than one's wit to an echo

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #155001
#9. Love's but a frailty of the mind, When 'tis not with ambition joined.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #169867
#10. If this be not love, it is madness, and then it is pardonable.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #179015
#11. Wit must be foiled by wit: cut a diamond with a diamond.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #183053
#12. Nothing but you can lay hold of my mind, and that can lay hold of nothing but you.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #213311
#13. O, nothing is more alluring than a levee from a couch in some confusion.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #276709
#14. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #362111
#15. Women are like tricks by sleight of hand,
Which, to admire, we should not understand

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #368760
#16. 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!

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #390929
#17. Heav'n hath no Rage, like Love to Hatred turn'd,
Nor Hell a Fury, like a Woman scorn'd.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #392418
#18. How hard a thing 'twould be to please you all.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #392487
#19. I came up stairs into the world, for I was born in a cellar.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #403240
#20. If there's delight in love, 'Tis when I see that heart, which others bleed for, bleed for me.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #421808
#21. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #429817
#22. You are a woman: you must never speak what you think; your words must contradict your thoughts, but your actions may contradict your words.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #479029
#23. A hungry wolf at all the herd will run, In hopes, through many, to make sure of one.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #503263
#24. For blessings ever wait on virtuous deeds, And though late, a sure reward succeeds.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #586059
#25. Invention flags, his brain goes muddy, and black despair succeeds brown study.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #602892
#26. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #658013
#27. A woman only obliges a man to secrecy, that she may have the pleasure of telling herself.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #668071
#28. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #680318
#29. He that first cries out stop thief, is often he that has stolen the treasure.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #698710
#30. Beauty is the lover's gift.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #732873
#31. Who pleases one against his will.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #752009
#32. Some by experience find those words mis-placed: At leisure married, they repent in haste.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #758745
#33. They are at the end of the gallery; retired to their tea and scandal, according to their ancient custom.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #760630
#34. I am always of the opinion with the learned, if they speak first.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #804725
#35. I find we are growing serious, and then we are in great danger of being dull.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #806352
#36. I always take blushing either for a sign of guilt, or of ill breeding.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #816444
#37. Though marriage makes man and wife one flesh, it leaves 'em still two fools.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #833373
#38. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #847643
#39. I hope you do not think me prone to any iteration of nuptials.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #852879
#40. It is the business of a comic poet to paint the vices and follies of human kind.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #859679
#41. Blessings ever wait on virtuous deeds, and though a late, a sure reward succeeds.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #860901
#42. Thou art a retailer of phrases, and dost deal in remnants of remnants.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #875758
#43. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #879021
#44. There are times when sense may be unseasonable, as well as truth.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #898465
#45. Delay not till tomorrow to be wise; tomorrow's sun to thee may neve rise.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #903741
#46. But say what you will, 'tis better to be left than never to have been loved. To pass our youth in dull indifference, to refuse the sweets of life because they once must leave us, is as preposterous as to wish to have been born old, because we one day must be old.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #923879
#47. No, I'm no enemy to learning; it hurts not me.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #949867
#48. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #952478
#49. Thus in this sad, but oh, too pleasing state! my soul can fix upon nothing but thee; thee it contemplates, admires, adores, nay depends on, trusts on you alone.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #973182
#50. I am a fool, I know it; and yet, Heaven help me, I'm poor enough to be a wit.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1030790
#51. These articles subscribed, if I continue to endure you a little longer, I may by degrees dwindle into wife.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1116060
#52. He who closes his ears to the views of others shows little confidence in the integrity of his own views.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1119698
#53. A little disdain is not amiss; a little scorn is alluring.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1127641
#54. Every man plays the fool once in his live, but to marry is playing the fool all one's life long.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1165342
#55. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1167982
#56. Hannibal was a very pretty fellow in those days.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1203419
#57. I nauseate walking; 'tis a country diversion, I loathe the country.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1211856
#58. Never go to bed angry, stay up and fight.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1233235
#59. Words are the weak support of cold indifference; love has no language to be heard.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1233686
#60. 'Tis well enough for a servant to be bred at an University. But the education is a little too pedantic for a gentleman.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1235299
#61. Uncertainty and expectation are the joys of life. Security is an insipid thing.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1256611
#62. They come together like the Coroner's Inquest, to sit upon the murdered reputations of the week.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1282923
#63. Mr Witwould: "Pray, madam, do you pin up your hair with all your letters? I find I must keep copies." Mrs Millamant: "Only with those in verse ... I never pin up my hair with prose."

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1323841
#64. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1356407
#65. I know that's a secret, for it's whispered everywhere.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1372821
#66. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1377900
#67. There is nothing more unbecoming a man of quality than to laugh ... 'tis such a vulgar expression of the passion!

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1388354
#68. Fear comes from uncertainty. When we are absolutely certain, whether of our worth or worthlessness, we are almost impervious to fear.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1390471
#69. Would any thing but a madman complain of uncertainty? Uncertainty and expectation are joys of life; security is an insipid thing; and the overtaking and possessing of a wish discovers the folly of the chase.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1447076
#70. Men are apt to offend ('tis true) where they find most goodness to forgive.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1448169
#71. Music hath charms to soothe a savage breast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1461556
#72. Say what you will, 'tis better to be left than never to have been loved.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1476752
#73. O, she is the antidote to desire.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1479897
#74. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1514077
#75. Whoever is king, is also the father of his country.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1522149
#76. Music hath charms to sooth a savage breast.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1526431
#77. Marriage indeed may qualify the fury of his passion, but it very rarely mends a man's manners.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1545258
#78. Grief walks upon the heels of pleasure; married in haste, we repent at leisure.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1553908
#79. You'll grow devilish fat upon this paper-diet!

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1564985
#80. If happiness in self-content is placed, The wise are wretched, and fools only blessed.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1601594
#81. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1678139
#82. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1683443
#83. Guilt is ever at a loss, and confusion waits upon it; when innocence and bold truth are always ready for expression.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1687626
#84. No mask like open truth to cover lies, As to go naked is the best disguise.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1689637
#85. Marriage is honourable, as you say; and if so, wherefore should Cuckoldom be a Discredit, being deriv'd from so honourable a Root?

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1698618
#86. 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.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1714548
#87. A wit should no more be sincere, than a woman constant; one argues a decay of parts, as to other of beauty.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1737700
#88. Women like flames have a destroying power; never to be quenched till they themselves devour.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1739470
#89. Music alone with sudden charms can bind The wand'ring sense, and calm the troubled mind.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1757261
#90. O fie, miss, you must not kiss and tell.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1825317
#91. One minute gives invention to destroy; What to rebuild, will a whole age employ.

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1846546
#92. Musick has charms to soothe a savage breast

William Congreve

William Congreve Quotes #1850243

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