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Who hath not heard the rich complain Of surfeits, and corporeal pain? He barr'd from every use of wealth, Envies the ploughman's strength and health.

John Gay

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John Gay
Age: 47 †
Born: 1685
Born: June 30
Died: 1732
Died: December 4
Librettist
Playwright
Poet
Writer
Barnstaple
Devon
Strength
Barr
Health
Ploughman
Wealth
Envies
Heard
Corporeal
Rich
Complain
Pain
Hath
Use
Complaining
Every
Envy

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You can only be called a hypocrite if you judge others first.
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Sure men were born to lie, and women to believe them!
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Some folks of cider make a rout And cider's well enough no doubt When better liquors fail But wine, that's richer, better still, Ev'n wine itself (deny't who will) Must yield to nappy ale
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Around the steel no tortur'd worm shall twine, No blood of living insect stain my line Let me, less cruel, cast the feather'd hook, With pliant rod athwart the pebbled brook, Silent along the mazy margin stray, And with the fur-wrought fly delude the prey.
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The charge is prepared the lawyers are met The judges all ranged (a terrible show!) I go, undismay'd. For death is a debt, A debt on demand. So take what I owe.
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Lions, wolves, and vultures don't live together in herds, droves or flocks. Of all animals of prey, man is the only sociable one. Every one of us preys upon his neighbor, and yet we herd together.
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Fair is the marigold, for pottage meet.
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Fair words cost nothing.
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Envy is a kind of praise.
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Whence is thy learning? Hath thy toil O'er books consumed the midnight oil?
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A man is always afraid of a woman that loves him too much
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[Gulliver was soon being read] from the cabinet council to the nursery.
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Nor love, not honor, wealth nor power, can give the heart a cheerful hour when health is lost. Be timely wise With health all taste of pleasure flies.
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Why is the hearse with scutcheons blazon'd round, And with the nodding plume of ostrich crown'd? No the dead know it not, nor profit gain It only serves to prove the living vain.
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Man may escape from rope and gun Nay, some have outlived the doctor's pill: Who takes a woman must be undone, That basilisk is sure to kill. The fly that sips treacle is lost in the sweets, So he that tastes woman, woman, woman, He that tastes woman, ruin meets.
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In every age and clime we see Two of a trade can never agree.
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Fools may our scorn, not envy, raise. For envy is a kind of praise.
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If the heart of a man is depressed with cares, The mist is dispelled when a woman appears.
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To shoot at crows is powder flung away.
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Envy's a sharper spur than pay.
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