True happiness consists not in the multitude of friends, but in the worth and choice.
BEN JONSONMany might go to heaven with half the labour they go to hell, if they would venture their industry the right way.
More Ben Jonson Quotes
-
-
Sweet meat must have sour sauce.
BEN JONSON -
And where she went, the flowers took thickest root, As she had sow’d them with her odorous foot.
BEN JONSON -
All discourses but my own afflict me; they seem harsh, impertinent, and irksome
BEN JONSON -
[The play] is like to be a very conceited scurvy one, in plain English.
BEN JONSON -
I have been at my book; and am now past the craggy paths of study, and come to the flowery plains of honour and reputation
BEN JONSON -
It holds for good polity ever, to have that outwardly in vilest estimation, which inwardly is most dear to us.
BEN JONSON -
I see compassion may become a justice, though it be a weakness, I confess, and nearer a vice than a virtue.
BEN JONSON -
All concord’s born of contraries.
BEN JONSON -
A thankful man owes a courtesy ever; the unthankful but when he needs it.
BEN JONSON -
Nor shall our cups make any guilty men; But at our parting, we will be, as when We innocently met.
BEN JONSON -
Reader look, not on his picture but his book.
BEN JONSON -
Language most shows a man, speak that I may see thee.
BEN JONSON -
How ready is heaven to those that pray!
BEN JONSON -
Popular men, They must create strange monsters, and then quell them, To make their arts seem something.
BEN JONSON -
Good men but see death, the wicked taste it.
BEN JONSON -
Forbear, you things That stand upon the pinnacles of state, To boast your slippery height! when you do fall, You dash yourselves in pieces, ne’er to rise: And he that lends you pity, is not wise.
BEN JONSON -
Many might go to heaven with half the labour they go to hell, if they would venture their industry the right way.
BEN JONSON -
Hell itself must yield to industry.
BEN JONSON -
Heaven prepares good men with crosses; but no ill can happen to a good man.
BEN JONSON -
Confound these ancestors… They’ve stolen our best ideas!
BEN JONSON -
The burnt child dreads the fire.
BEN JONSON -
True melancholy breeds your perfect fine wit.
BEN JONSON -
Well, as he brews, so shall he drink.
BEN JONSON -
True gladness doth not always speak; joy, bred and born but in the tongue, is weak.
BEN JONSON -
Princes that would their people should do well Must at themselves begin, as at the head; For men, by their example, pattern out Their limitations, and regard of laws: A virtuous court a world to virtue draws.
BEN JONSON -
I have no urns, no dusty monuments; No broken images of ancestors, Wanting an ear, or nose; no forged tales Of long descents, to boast false honors from.
BEN JONSON