William Congreve Quotes

Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned, Nor hell a fury like a woman scorned.

Uncertainty and expectation are the joys of life.

If there's delight in love, 'Tis when I see that heart, which others bleed for, bleed for me.

Blessings ever wait on virtuous deeds, and though a late, a sure reward succeeds.

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

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

A wit should no more be sincere, than a woman constant;

one argues a decay of parts, as to other of beauty.

Music hath charms to soothe a savage breast, To soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.N.B.: This quote is commonly misquoted as savage beast.

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

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

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

Grief walks upon the heels of pleasure; married in haste, we repent at leisure.

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.

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.

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.

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.

Musick has Charms to sooth a savage Breast...

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.

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."

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

Nor Hell a Fury, like a Woman scorn'd.

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

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.

Some by experience find those words mis-placed: At leisure married, they repent in haste.

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

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

Every man plays the fool once in his live, but to marry is playing the fool all one's life long.

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

Beauty is the lover's gift.

'Tis well enough for a servant to be bred at an University.

But the education is a little too pedantic for a gentleman.

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

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

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

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.

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

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

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

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.

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

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!

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.

There is nothing more unbecoming a man of quality than to laugh .

.. 'tis such a vulgar expression of the passion!

Marriage indeed may qualify the fury of his passion, but it very rarely mends a man's manners.

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

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

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

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

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

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

He that first cries out stop thief, is often he that has stolen the treasure.