William Congreve Quotes

76 Sourced Quotes

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

Careless she is with artful care,
Affecting to seem unaffected.

William Congreve

I know that's a secret, for it's whispered every where.

William Congreve

I confess freely to you, I could never look long upon a monkey, without very mortifying reflections.

William Congreve

For blessings ever wait on virtuous deeds,
And though a late, a sure reward succeeds.

William Congreve

Uncertainty and expectation are the joys of life. Security is an insipid thing.

William Congreve

It is the business of a comic poet to paint the vices and follies of human kind.

William Congreve

Here she comes i' faith full sail, with her fan spread and streamers out, and a shoal of fools for tenders. — Ha, no, I cry her mercy!

William Congreve

I always take blushing either for a sign of guilt, or of ill breeding.

William Congreve

Love's but a frailty of the mind,
When 'tis not with ambition joined.

William Congreve

I came upstairs into the world; for I was born in a cellar.

William Congreve

I hope you do not think me prone to any iteration of nuptials.

William Congreve

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

Musick has Charms to sooth a savage Breast,
To soften Rocks, or bend a knotted Oak.
I've read, that things inanimate have mov'd,
And, as with living Souls, have been inform'd,
By Magick Numbers and persuasive Sound.
What then am I? Am I more senseless grown
Than Trees, or Flint? O force of constant Woe!
'Tis not in Harmony to calm my Griefs.
Anselmo sleeps, and is at Peace; last Night
The silent Tomb receiv'd the good Old King;
He and his Sorrows now are safely lodg'd
Within its cold, but hospitable Bosom.
Why am not I at Peace?

William Congreve

Men are apt to offend ('tis true) where they find most goodness to forgive.

William Congreve

A branch of one of your antediluvian families, fellows that the flood could not wash away.

William Congreve

Music has charms to soothe a savage breast,
To soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.

William Congreve

Courtship to marriage, as a very witty prologue to a very dull play.

William Congreve

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

I am always of the opinion with the learned, if they speak first.

William Congreve

I nauseate walking; 'tis a country diversion, I loathe the country.

William Congreve

Witwoud: Madam, do you pin up your hair with all your letters?
Millamant: Only with those in verse, Mr. Witwoud. I never pin up my hair with prose.

William Congreve

A little disdain is not amiss; a little scorn is alluring.

William Congreve

These articles subscribed, if I continue to endure you a little longer, I may by degrees dwindle into a wife.

William Congreve

Man was by Nature Woman's cully made:
We never are, but by ourselves, betrayed.

William Congreve