wit

We grant, although he had much wit, He was very shy of using it; As being loath to wear it out, And therefore bore it not about, Unless on holidays, or so, As men their best apparel do.

—Butler, Samuel

Some time ago, in an interview that turned towards the Theatre, I suggested that 'Pubic hair is not an adequate substitute for wit'. My point now is that depending upon shock tactics is easy, whereas writing a good play is difficult.

—Priestley,J(ohn) B(oynton)

Come sleep,O sleep, the certain knot of peace, The baiting place of wit, the balm of woe, The poor man's wealth, the prisoner's release, The indifferent judge between the high and low.

—Shute, Nevil originally Nevil Shute Norway

The rest to some faint meaning make pretence, But Shadwell never deviates into sense. Some beams of wit on other souls may fall, Strike through and make a lucid interval; But Shadwell's genuine night admits no ray, His rising fogs prevail upon the day.

—Dryden,John

The silver-haired, pipe-smoking northerner was a consummate British politician: tenacious, shrewd, manipulative, a blend of homespun tastes, acid wit and pragmatic, often shifting policies†the symbol of an emerging middle-class Briton. McGonagall

—McFadden, Robert D(ennis)

A Free Man is he, that in those things, which by his strength and wit he is able to do, is not hindered to do what he has a will to.

—Hobbes,Thomas

One cannot say he wanted wit, but rather that he was frugal of it.

—Dryden,John

Shakespeare†was the man who of all modern, and perhaps ancient poets, had the largest and most comprehensive soul. All images of Nature were still present to him, and he drew them, not laboriously, but luckily; when he describes anything, you more than see it, you feel it too. Those who accuse him to have wanted learning, give him the greater commendation: he was naturally learned; he needed not the spectacles of books to read Nature; he looked inwards, and found her there† He is many times flat, insipid; his comic wit degenerating into clenches, his serious swelling into bombast. But he is always great.

—Dryden,John

Ay, a plague on't, My conscience fools my wit!

—Jonson, Ben

French truth,Dutch prowess,British policy, Hibernian learning, Scotch civility, Spaniards'dispatch,Danes' wit, are mainly seen in thee.

—Rochester,JohnWilmot, 2nd Earl of

Farewell Woman, I intend, Henceforth, every night to sit, With my lewd well natured friend, Drinking, to engender wit.

—Rochester,JohnWilmot, 2nd Earl of

Il ne faut point donner d'esprit a'   ses personnages; mais savoir les placer dans des circonstances qui leur en donnent. You should not give wit to your characters, but know instead how to put them in situations which will make them witty.

—Diderot, Denis

But had I wist, before I kiss'd, That love had been sae ill to win. I'd lock'd my heart in a case o'gowd, And pinn'd it wi'a siller pin.

—Ballads

What, he speaks unseasonable truths sometimes, because he has not wit enough to invent an evasion.

—Congreve,William

If a man write little, he had need have a great memory; if he confer little, hehad need have a present wit; and if he read little he had need have much cunning, to seem to know that he doth not.

—Bacon, Francis,Viscount St Albans

He knew what's what, and that's as high As metaphysic wit can fly.

—Butler, Samuel

His fine wit Makes such a wound, the knife is lost in it.

—Shelley, Percy Bysshe

His wit invites you by his looks to come, But when you knock it never is at home.

—Cowper,William

Impropriety is the soul of wit.

—Maugham,W(illiam) Somerset

Oh! it is onlya novel!†only some work in which the most thorough knowledge of human nature, the happiest delineationof itsvarieties,theliveliesteffusions of wit and humour are conveyed to the world in the best chosen language.

—Austen,Jane

   My Love in her attire doth show her wit, It doth so well become her; For every season she hath dressings fit, For winter, spring, and summer. No beauty she doth miss When all her robes are on; But beauty's self she is When all her robes are gone.

—Anonymous

Much malice mingled with a little wit Perhaps may censure this mysterious writ.

—Dryden,John

Marriage is the grave or tomb of wit.

—Cavendish, Margaret, Duchess of Newcastle

  Poetry isthe honey of all flowers, the quintessence of all

—Nashe,Thomas

C'est un me¤  tier que de faire un livre, comme de faire une pendule; il faut plus que de l'esprit pour e"  tre auteur. It is as much a trade to write a book as it is to make a watch; it takes more than wit to make an author.

—La Bruye'  re,Jean de

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.

—Congreve,William

And new philosophy calls all in doubt, The element of fire is quite put out; The sun is lost, and th'earth, and no man's wit Can well direct him, where to look for it.

—Donne,John

And though she had some decays in the face, she had none in her sense and wit.

—Behan, Brendan Francis

I am no pick-purse of another's wit.

—Shute, Nevil originally Nevil Shute Norway

Talking of the Comedy of 'The Rehearsal', he said 'It has not enough wit to keep it sweet.' This was easy;öhe therefore caught himself, and pronounced a more rounded sentence; 'It hasnot vitalityenoughtopreserve it from putrefaction.'

—Johnson, Samuel known as Dr Johnson

Who now reads Cowley? if he pleases yet, His moral pleases, not his pointed wit.

—Pope, Alexander

No princely pomp, no wealthy store, No force to win the victory, No wily wit to salve a sore, No shape to feed each gazing eye; To none of these I yield as thrall. For why my mind doth serve for all.

—Dyer, Sir Edward

Rain, rain, and sun! a rainbow in the sky! Ayoung man will be wiser byand by; An old man's wit may wander ere he die.

—Tennyson

Old Mother Wit, and Nature gave Shakespeare and Fletcher all they have; In Spenser, and in Jonson, Art Of slower Nature got the start.

—Denham, SirJohn

This man I thought had been a Lord among wits; but, I find, he is only a wit among Lords.

—Johnson, Samuel known as Dr Johnson

The moving finger writes; and, having writ, Moves on: nor all thy piety nor wit Shall lure it back to cancel half a line, Nor all thy tears wash out a word of it.

—Fitzgerald, Edward

Towered cities pleased us then, And the busy hum of men, Where throngs of knights and barons bold In weeds of peace high triumphs hold, With store of ladies, whose bright eyes Rain influence, and judge the prize Of wit or arms, while both contend To win her grace, whom all commend.

—Milton,John

If there be not in her, a proud mind, a crafty wit, and an indurate heart against God and his truth, my judgment faileth me.

—Knox,John

For [the] quick in wit and light in manners be either seldom troubled or very soon weary, in carrying a very heavy purse.

—Ascham, Roger

What is beauty, saith my sufferings, then? If all the pens that ever poets held Had fed the feeling of their masters'thoughts, And every sweetness that inspired their hearts, Their minds, and muses on admire'  d themes; If all the heavenly quintessence they still From their immortal flowers of poesy, Wherein, as in a mirror, we perceive The highest reaches of a human wit; If these had made one poem's period, And all combined in beauty's worthiness, Yet should there hover in their restless heads One thought, one grace, one wonder, at the least, Which into words no virtue can digest.

—Marlowe, Christopher

If I would compare [Jonson] with Shakespeare, I must acknowledge him the more correct poet, but Shakespeare the greater wit.

—Dryden,John

In all thy humours, whether grave or mellow, Thou'rt such a touchy, testy, pleasant fellow; Hast so much wit, and mirth, and spleen about thee, There is no living with thee, nor without thee.

—Addison,Joseph

Imyself haveheard averygood jest, and havescornedto seem to have so sillya wit as to understand it.

—Webster,John

L'esprit de l'escalier. Staircase wit.

—Diderot, Denis

There still remains, to mortifya wit, The many-headed monster of the pit.

—Pope, Alexander

Who, too deep for his hearers, still went on refining, And thought of convincing, while they thought of dining; Though equal to all things, for all things unfit, Too nice for a statesman, too proud for a wit.

—Goldsmith, Oliver

Poets like painters, thus unskilled to trace The naked nature and the living grace, With gold and jewels cover ev'ry part, And hide with ornaments their want of art. True wit is Nature to advantage dressed, What oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed.

—Pope, Alexander

Here lies a king, that ruled as he thought fit The universal monarchy of wit.

—Carew,Thomas

Why should I let the toad work Squat on my life? Can't I use my wit as a pitchfork And drive the brute off? Six days of the week it soils With its sickening poisonö Just for paying a few bills! That's out of proportion.

—Larkin, Philip Arthur

   What things have we seen, Done at the Mermaid! heard words that have been So nimble, and so full of subtil flame, As if that every one from whence they came, Had meant to put his whole wit in a jest, And had resolv'd to live a fool, the rest Of his dull life.

—Beaumont, Francis

Neither have the heart to stay, Nor wit enough to run away.

—Butler, Samuel

There's a hell of a distance between wise-cracking and wit.Wit has truth in it; wise-cracking is simply callisthenics with words.

—Parker, Dorothy ne¤  e Rothschild

Vex not thou the poet's mind With thy shallow wit: Vex not thou the poet's mind; For thou canst not fathom it.

—Tennyson

A thing well said will be wit in all languages†though it may lose something in the translation.

—Dryden,John

Wit ismore necessary than beauty; and I think no young woman ugly that has it, and no handsome woman agreeable without it.

—Wycherley,William

Wit, you know, is the unexpected copulation of ideas, the discoveryof some occult relation between imagesin appearance remote from each other.

—Johnson, Samuel known as Dr Johnson

   What is an Epigram? a dwarfish whole, Its body brevity, and wit its soul.

—Coleridge, Samuel Taylor

Cricket is the greatest game that the wit of man has yet devised.

—Warner, Sir Pelham Plum

Awit should no more be sincerethana woman constant; one argues a decay of parts, as t'other of beauty.

—Congreve,William

A wit with dunces, and a dunce with wits.

—Pope, Alexander

In youth open your mind, And let all learning in; Words the head does not shape Are worthless, out and in. Words wit has not salted,No nearer the heart than the lip, Are nothing more than wind, A puppy's insolent yelp.

—Anonymous

I grow in worth, and wit, and sense, Unboding critic-pen, Or that eternal want of pence, Which vexes public men.

—Tennyson