Top 70 William Congreve Quotes (2024 Update)

1. “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.”

— William Congreve

2. “Heav’n hath no Rage, like Love to Hatred turn’d, Nor Hell a Fury, like a Woman scorn’d.”

— William Congreve

3. “Music has charms to sooth a savage breast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak.”

— William Congreve

4. “You are a woman: you must never speak what you think; your words must contradict your thoughts, but your actions may contradict your words.”

— William Congreve

5. “Music has charms to soothe a savage breast, to soften rocks, or bend a knotted oak. I’ve read that things inanimate have moved, and, as with living souls, have been inform’d, by magic numbers and persuasive sound.”

— William Congreve

6. “There is in true beauty, as in courage, something which narrow souls cannot dare to admire.”

— William Congreve

7. “Delay not till tomorrow to be wise; tomorrow’s sun to thee may neve rise.”

— William Congreve

8. “Say what you will, ’tis better to be left than never to have been loved.”

— William Congreve

9. “Uncertainty and expectation are the joys of life. Security is an insipid thing.”

— William Congreve

10. “Women like flames have a destroying power; never to be quenched till they themselves devour.”

— William Congreve

11. “No mask like open truth to cover lies, As to go naked is the best disguise.”

— William Congreve

12. “Nothing but you can lay hold of my mind, and that can lay hold of nothing but you.”

— William Congreve

13. “Music alone with sudden charms can bind The wand’ring sense, and calm the troubled mind.”

— William Congreve

14. “Beauty is the lover’s gift.”

— William Congreve

15. “He that first cries out stop thief, is often he that has stolen the treasure.”

— William Congreve

16. “Blessings ever wait on virtuous deeds, and though a late, a sure reward succeeds.”

— William Congreve

17. “Courtship is to marriage, as a very witty prologue to a very dull play.”

— William Congreve

18. “He who closes his ears to the views of others shows little confidence in the integrity of his own views.”

— William Congreve

19. “I know that’s a secret, for it’s whispered everywhere.”

— William Congreve

20. “I am always of the opinion with the learned, if they speak first.”

— William Congreve

21. “Thou art a retailer of phrases, and dost deal in remnants of remnants.”

— William Congreve

22. “Women are like tricks by sleight of hand, Which, to admire, we should not understand.”

— William Congreve

23. “O, she is the antidote to desire.”

— William Congreve

24. “O fie, miss, you must not kiss and tell.”

— William Congreve

25. “A wit should no more be sincere, than a woman constant; one argues a decay of parts, as to other of beauty.”

— William Congreve

26. “A hungry wolf at all the herd will run, In hopes, through many, to make sure of one.”

— William Congreve

27. “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.”

— William Congreve

28. “Grief walks upon the heels of pleasure; married in haste, we repent at leisure.”

— William Congreve

29. “If this be not love, it is madness, and then it is pardonable.”

— William Congreve

30. “Marriage is honourable, as you say; and if so, wherefore should Cuckoldom be a Discredit, being deriv’d from so honourable a Root?”

— William Congreve

31. “I confess freely to you, I could never look long upon a monkey, without very mortifying reflections.”

— William Congreve

32. “If happiness in self-content is placed, The wise are wretched, and fools only blessed.”

— William Congreve

33. “I know a lady that loves to talk so incessantly, she won’t give an echo fair play; she has that everlasting rotation of tongue that an echo must wait till she dies before it can catch her last words!”

— William Congreve

34. “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.”

— William Congreve

35. “Every man plays the fool once in his live, but to marry is playing the fool all one’s life long.”

— William Congreve

36. “A woman only obliges a man to secrecy, that she may have the pleasure of telling herself.”

— William Congreve

37. “Fear comes from uncertainty. When we are absolutely certain, whether of our worth or worthlessness, we are almost impervious to fear.”

— William Congreve

38. “Some by experience find those words mis-placed: At leisure married, they repent in haste.”

— William Congreve

39. “But say what you will, ’tis better to be left than never to have been loved. To pass our youth in dull indifference, to refuse the sweets of life because they once must leave us, is as preposterous as to wish to have been born old, because we one day must be old.”

— William Congreve

40. “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

41. “There are come Critics so with Spleen diseased, They scarcely come inclining to be pleased: And sure he must have more than mortal Skill, Who please one against his Will.”

— William Congreve

42. “Wit must be foiled by wit: cut a diamond with a diamond.”

— William Congreve

43. “These articles subscribed, if I continue to endure you a little longer, I may by degrees dwindle into wife.”

— William Congreve

44. “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.”

— William Congreve

45. “I am a fool, I know it; and yet, Heaven help me, I’m poor enough to be a wit.”

— William Congreve

46. “They are at the end of the gallery; retired to their tea and scandal, according to their ancient custom.”

— William Congreve

47. “Words are the weak support of cold indifference; love has no language to be heard.”

— William Congreve

48. “I nauseate walking; ’tis a country diversion, I loathe the country.”

— William Congreve

49. “Though marriage makes man and wife one flesh, it leaves ’em still two fools.”

— William Congreve

50. “One minute gives invention to destroy; What to rebuild, will a whole age employ.”

— William Congreve