Quotes
Quotes about Wit
Out of our quarrels with others we make rhetoric. Out of our quarrels with ourselves we make poetry.
The castled crag of Drachenfels, Frowns o'er the wide and winding Rhine, Whose breast of waters broadly swells Between the banks which bear the vine, And hills all rich with blossom'd trees, And fields which promise corn and wine, And scatter'd cities crowning these, Whose far white walls along them shine.
I've seen the Rhine with younger wave, O'er every obstacle to rave. I see the Rhine in his native wild Is still a mighty mountain child.
That passage is what I call the sublime dashed to pieces by cutting too close with the fiery four-in-hand round the corner of nonsense.
'Twas the saying of an ancient sage that humour was the only test of gravity, and gravity of humour. For a subject which would not bear raillery was suspicious; and a jest which would not bear a serious examination was certainly false wit. - Sir Anthony Ashley Cooper, 7th Earl of Shaftesbury,
Jane borrow'd maxims from a doubting school, And took for truth the test of ridicule; Lucy saw no such virtue in a jest, Truth was with her of ridicule the test.
I distrust those sentiments that are too far removed from nature, and whose sublimity is blended with ridicule; which two are as near one another as extreme wisdom and folly.
Scoff not at the natural defects of any which are not in their power to amend. It is cruel to beat a cripple with his own crutches!
The rule of the road is a paradox quite, If you drive with a whip or a thong; If you go to the left you are sure to be right, If you go to the right you are wrong.
With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right.
Among the natural rights of the colonists are these: First a right to life, secondly to liberty, thirdly to property; together with the right to defend them in the best manner they can.
We hold these truths to be self-evident,--that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights; that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
No man was ever endowed with a right without being at the same time saddled with a responsibility.
From the equality of rights springs identity of our highest interests; you cannot subvert your neighbor's rights without striking a dangerous blow at your own.
We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
Far better is it to dare mighty things, to win glorious triumphs even though checkered by failure than to take rank with those poor spirits who neither enjoy much nor suffer much because they live in the grey twilight that knows neither victory nor defeat.
Our lives improve only when we take chances - and the first and most difficult risk we can take is to be honest with ourselves.
To win without risk is to triumph without glory.
Farewell, my friends! farewell, my foes! My peace with these, my love with those. The bursting tears my heart declare; Farewell, the bonnie banks of Ayr.
Ayr, gurgling, kissed his pebbled shore, O'erhung with wild woods, thickening green; The fragrant birch and hawthorn hoar Twined amorous round the raptures scene.
Out of the hills of Habersham, Down the valleys of Hall, I hurry amain to reach the plain; Run the rapid and leap the fall, Split at the rock, and together again Accept my bed, or narrow or wide, And flee from folly on every side With a lover's pain to attain the plain, Far from the hills of Habersham, Far from the valleys of Hall.
Then I saw the Congo, creeping through the black, Cutting through the jungle with a golden track.
How sweet to move at summer's eve By Clyde's meandering stream, When Sol in joy is seen to leave The earth with crimson beam; When islands that wandered far Above his sea couch lie, And here and there some gem-like star Re-opes its sparkling eye.
From Stirling Castle we had seen The mazy Forth unravelled; Had trod the banks of Clyde and Tay, And with the Tweed had travelled; And when we came to Clovenford, Then said "my winsome marrow," "Whate'er betide, we'll turn aside, And see the braes of Yarrow."
The redbreast oft, at evening hours, Shall kindly lend his little aid, With hoary moss, and gathered flowers, To deck the ground where thou art laid.
