William Congreve Quotes

William Congreve delivers witty, bittersweet musings on love, marriage, and human folly that feel like a clever stage whisper.

58 quotes

1. Ah! Whither, whither shall I fly, A poor unhappy Maid; To hopeless Love and Misery By my own Heart betray'd?

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

3. Invention flags, his brain goes muddy, And black despair succeeds brown study.

4. Defer not till tomorrow to be wise, Tomorrow's sun to thee may never rise.

5. 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.

6. I find we are growing serious, and then we are in great danger of being dull.

7. Eternity was in that moment.

8. If this be not love, it is madness, and then it is pardonable.

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

10. Thus grief still treads upon the heels of pleasure; Married in haste, we may repent at leisure.

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

12. Retired to their tea and scandal, according to their ancient custom.

13. Though marriage makes man and wife one flesh, it leaves 'em still two fools.

14. No mask like open truth to cover lies, As to go naked is the best disguise.

15. Thou liar of the first magnitude.

16. I warrant you, if he danced till doomsday, he thought I was to pay the piper.

17. O fie, miss, you must not kiss and tell.

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

19. Women are like tricks by sleight of hand, Which, to admire, we should not understand.

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

21. 'Tis well enough for a servant to be bred at an University. But the education is a little too pedantic for a gentleman.

22. 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?

23. Vile and ingrate! too late thou shalt repent The base Injustice thou hast done my Love: Yes, thou shalt know, spite of thy past Distress, And all those Ills which thou so long hast mourn'd; Heav'n has no Rage, like Love to Hatred turn'd, Nor Hell a Fury, like a Woman scorn'd.

24. They come together like the Coroner's Inquest, to sit upon the murdered reputations of the week.

25. Say what you will, tis better to be left than never to have been loved.

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

27. If there's delight in love, 'tis when I see That heart which others bleed for, bleed for me.

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

29. 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.

30. Thou art a retailer of phrases, and dost deal in remnants of remnants.

31. O, she is the antidote to desire.

32. Never go to bed angry, stay up and fight.

33. Wit must be foiled by wit: cut a diamond with a diamond.

34. 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."

35. He who closes his ears to the views of others shows little confidence in the integrity of his own views.

36. 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.

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

38. Marriage is honourable, as you say; and if so, wherefore should Cuckoldom be a Discredit, being deriv'd from so honourable a Root?

39. A wit should no more be sincere, than a woman constant; one argues a decay of parts, as to other of beauty.

40. There is in true Beauty, as in Courage, somewhat which narrow Souls cannot dare to admire.

41. I am a fool, I know it; and yet, Heaven help me, I'm poor enough to be a wit.

42. There is nothing more unbecoming a man of quality than to laugh ... 'tis such a vulgar expression of the passion!

43. 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.

44. Believe it, Men have ever been the same, And all the Golden Age is but a Dream.

45. 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.

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

47. There are times when sense may be unseasonable, as well as truth.

48. Music alone with sudden charms can bind The wand'ring sense, and calm the troubled mind.

49. A woman only obliges a man to secrecy, that she may have the pleasure of telling herself.

50. All well bred persons lie - Besides, you are a woman; you must never speak what you think.

51. One minute gives invention to destroy; What to rebuild, will a whole age employ.

52. Fear comes from uncertainty. When we are absolutely certain, whether of our worth or worthlessness, we are almost impervious to fear.

53. 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.

54. If happiness in self-content is placed, The wise are wretched, and fools only blessed.

55. Women like flames have a destroying power; never to be quenched till they themselves devour.

56. 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.

57. How hard a thing 'twould be to please you all.

58. 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.