If you succeed not, cast not away the quills yet, nor scratch the wainscot, beat not the poor desk, but bring all to the forge and file again; turn it new.
BEN JONSONThe voice so sweet, the words so fair, As some soft chime had stroked the air; And though the sound had parted thence, Still left an echo in the sense.
More Ben Jonson Quotes
-
-
A lily of a day Is fairer far in May, Although it fall and die that night, It was the plant and flower of light. In small proportions we just beauties see, And in short measures life may perfect be.
BEN JONSON -
The covetous man never has money. The prodigal will have none shortly.
BEN JONSON -
Men that talk of their own benefits are not believed to talk of them because they have done them, but to have done them because they might talk of them.
BEN JONSON -
Fortune, that favors fools.
BEN JONSON -
It is as great a spite to be praised in the wrong place, and by a wrong person, as can be done to a noble nature.
BEN JONSON -
It is virtue that gives glory; that will endenizen a man everywhere.
BEN JONSON -
He that departs with his own honesty For Vulgar , doth it too dearly buy.
BEN JONSON -
The dignity of truth is lost with much protesting.
BEN JONSON -
It is an art to have so much judgment as to apparel a lie well, to give it a good dressing.
BEN JONSON -
The voice so sweet, the words so fair, As some soft chime had stroked the air; And though the sound had parted thence, Still left an echo in the sense.
BEN JONSON -
I am beholden to calumny, that she hath so endeavored to belie me.-It shall make me set a surer guard on myself, and keep a better watch upon my actions.
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 -
Sweet Swan of Avon! What a sight it were To see thee in our water yet appear.
BEN JONSON -
Tis no sin love’s fruits to steal; But the sweet thefts to reveal; To be taken, to be seen, These have crimes accounted been.
BEN JONSON -
The pipe marks the point at which the orangutan ends and man begins.
BEN JONSON -
Hang sorrow, care’ll kill a cat.
BEN JONSON -
Who falls for love of God, shall rise a star.
BEN JONSON -
All concord’s born of contraries.
BEN JONSON -
Who casts to write a living line, must sweat.
BEN JONSON -
It is the highest of earthly honors to be descended from the great and good. They alone cry out against a noble ancestry who have none of their own.
BEN JONSON -
One woman reads another’s character Without the tedious trouble of deciphering
BEN JONSON -
In small proportions we just beauties see; And in short measures, life may perfect be.
BEN JONSON -
Court a mistress, she denies you; let her alone, she will court you.
BEN JONSON -
Love that is ignorant and hatred have almost the same ends.
BEN JONSON -
Rich apparel has strange virtues; it makes him that hath it without means esteemed for an excellent wit; he that enjoys it with means puts the world in remembrance of his means.
BEN JONSON -
Whom the disease of talking still once posses-seth, he can never hold his peace.
BEN JONSON