Ben Jonson
57 quotes
Biography
Ben Jonson was an English actor, poet and playwright. Jonson's artistry exerted a lasting influence on English poetry and stage comedy.
"They say Princes learn no art truly, but the art of horsemanship. The reason is, the brave beast is no flatterer. He will throw a prince as soon as his groom."
"Success produces confidence; confidence relaxes industry, and negligence ruins the reputation which accuracy had raised."
"Art hath an enemy call'd ignorance."
"That old bald cheater, Time."
"Of all wild beasts preserve me from a tyrant; and of all tame, a flatterer."
"The world knows only two, — that's Rome and I."
"Calumnies are answered best with silence."
"Preserving the sweetness of proportion and expressing itself beyond expression."
"Thou look'st like Antichrist in that lewd hat."
"I will eat exceedingly, and prophesy."
"The burnt child dreads the fire."
"The Devil is an Ass! fool'd off! and beaten!"
"The Devil is an Ass, I do acknowledge it."
"Opinion is a light, vain, crude, and imperfect thing."
"A good life is a main argument."
"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."
"A cripple in the way out-travels a footman or a post out of the way."
"He is a narrow-minded man, that affects a triumph in any glorious study; but to triumph in a lie, and a lie themselves have forged, is frontless. Folly often goes beyond her bounds; but Impudence knows none."
"It is an art to have so much judgment as to apparel a lie well, to give it a good dressing."
"I remember the players have often mentioned it as an honor to Shakespeare, that in his writing, whatsoever he penned, he never blotted out a line. My answer hath been, "Would he had blotted a thousand"."
"I loved the man and do honor his memory, on this side idolatry, as much as any."
"Greatness of name in the father oft-times overwhelms the son; they stand too near one another. The shadow kills the growth: so much, that we see the grandchild come more and oftener to be heir of the first."
"Though the most be players, some must be spectators."
"One, though he be excellent and the chief, is not to be imitated alone; for never no imitator ever grew up to his author; likeness is always on this side truth. Yet there happened in my time one noble speaker, who was full of gravity in his speaking; his language (where he could spare or pass by a jest) was nobly censorious. No man ever spake more neatly, more pressly, more weightily, or suffered less emptiness, less idleness, in what he uttered. No member of his speech but consisted of his own graces. His hearers could not cough, or look aside from him, without loss. He commanded where he spoke, and had his judges angry and pleased at his devotion. No man had their affections more in his power. The fear of every man that heard him was lest he should make an end."
"Lady: How do's it fit? wilt come together? Prudence: Hardly. Lad: Thou must make shift with it. Pride feels no Pain."