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

William Congreve

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William Congreve
Age: 58 †
Born: 1670
Born: January 24
Died: 1729
Died: January 19
Engineer
Librettist
Playwright
Poet
Translator
Writer
Manners
Indeed
Marriage
Passion
Mends
May
Qualify
Men
Fury
Courtesy
Rarely

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I confess freely to you, I could never look long upon a monkey, without very mortifying reflections.
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A woman only obliges a man to secrecy, that she may have the pleasure of telling herself.
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I nauseate walking 'tis a country diversion, I loathe the country.
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I came up stairs into the world, for I was born in a cellar.
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A hungry wolf at all the herd will run, In hopes, through many, to make sure of one.
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You are a woman: you must never speak what you think your words must contradict your thoughts, but your actions may contradict your words.
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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.
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He who closes his ears to the views of others shows little confidence in the integrity of his own views.
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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.
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O ay, letters - I had letters - I am persecuted with letters - I hate letters - nobody knows how to write letters and yet one has 'em, one does not know why - they serve one to pin up one's hair.
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Come, come, leave business to idlers, and wisdom to fools: they have need of 'em: wit be my faculty, and pleasure my occupation, and let father Time shake his glass.
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They come together like the Coroner's Inquest, to sit upon the murdered reputations of the week.
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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.
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Turn pimp, flatterer, quack, lawyer, parson, be chaplain to an atheist, or stallion to an old woman, anything but a poet for a poet is worse, more servile, timorous and fawning than any I have named.
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There is nothing more unbecoming a man of quality than to laugh ... 'tis such a vulgar expression of the passion!
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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.
William Congreve
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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.
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Would any thing but a madman complain of uncertainty? Uncertainty and expectation are joys of life security is an insipid thing and the overtaking and possessing of a wish discovers the folly of the chase.
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Musick has Charms to sooth a savage Breast...
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Defer not till to-morrow to be wise, To-morrow's Sun to thee may never rise Or should to-morrow chance to cheer thy sight With her enlivening and unlook'd for light, How grateful will appear her dawning rays! As favours unexpected doubly please.
William Congreve