A Dram of Epigrams in Art, Poetry, Literature, Politics, Religion and Elsewhere
For our purposes and pleasure, we will construe the term "epigram" broadly
enough to include short poems, one-liners, zingers, spoonerisms, witticisms,
etc.
Epigrams about Epigrams
What is an epigram? A dwarfish whole;
Its body brevity, and wit its soul.
--Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Since brevity is the soul of wit,
And tediousness the limbs and outward flourishes,
I will be brief.
--William Shakespeare
If, with the literate, I am
Impelled to try an epigram,
I never seek to take the credit;
We all assume that Oscar said it.
--Dorothy Parker
Wilde about Oscar
America is the only country that went from barbarism to decencies without
civilization in between.--Oscar Wilde
The public is wonderfully tolerant. It forgives everything except genius.--Oscar Wilde
A cynic is a man who knows the price of everything and the value of nothing.--Oscar Wilde
I can resist everything except temptation.--Oscar Wilde
The way to get rid of temptation is to yield to it.--Oscar Wilde
A fashion is merely a form of ugliness so unbearable that we are compelled to
alter it every six months.--Oscar Wilde
It is a much cleverer thing to talk nonsense than to listen to it.--Oscar Wilde
Ah, well, then I suppose I shall have to die beyond my means.--Oscar Wilde
(his last words)
Poems about Poets
Swans sing before they die-- 'twere no bad thing
should certain people die before they sing!
--Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Poets aren't very useful
Because they aren't consumeful or produceful.
--Ogden Nash
Readers and listeners praise my books;
You swear they're worse than a beginner's.
Who cares? I always plan my dinners
To please the diners, not the cooks.
--Martial, translated by R. L. Barth
When I am dead, I hope it may be said:
His sins were scarlet, but his books were read.
--Hilaire Belloc
Though Edgar Poe writes a lucid prose
Just and rhetorical without exertion,
It loses all lucidity, God knows,
In the single, poorly rendered English version.
--Thom Gunn
Celebrity Inebriety
I'd rather have a bottle in front of me
than a frontal lobotomy.
--Dorothy Parker
Lady Astor: "Winston, you're drunk!"
Winston Churchill: "But I shall be sober in the morning and you, madam, will
still be ugly."
Lady Astor: "Mr Churchill, if you were my husband, I'd put poison in your
tea."
Winston Churchill: "Madam, if I were your husband, I'd drink it."
A hangover is the wrath of grapes.--Unknown
Twain Well Met
The man who does not read good books has no advantage over the man who cannot read them.--Mark Twain
It is better to keep your mouth shut and appear stupid than to open it and
remove all doubt.--Mark Twain
By trying we can easily learn to endure adversity. Another man's, I mean.--Mark Twain
Always do right. That will gratify some of the people, and astonish the rest.--Mark Twain
It is noble to be good; it is still nobler to teach others to be good-- and
less trouble.--Mark Twain
If you pick up a starving dog and make him prosperous, he will not bite you.
This is the principal difference between a dog and a man.--Mark Twain
Don't take life too seriously; you'll never get out of it alive anyway.--Mark Twain
Wrinkles should merely indicate where smiles have been.--Mark Twain
If at first you don't succeed, try again.
Then quit; there's no use being a damn fool about it.--Mark Twain
When I was 14, I couldn't believe how ignorant my father was.
By the time I turned 21, I was astounded at how much the old man had learned
in just seven years.--Mark Twain
Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn't
do than by the ones you did do.
So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade
winds in your sails.
Explore. Dream. Discover.--Mark Twain
Dowager Power
Nobody can make you feel inferior without your permission.--Eleanor Roosevelt
If you can't be a good example, then you'll just have to be a horrible
warning.--Catherine the Great
In politics, if you want anything said, ask a man. If you want anything done,
ask a woman.--Margaret Thatcher
Pierced by Bierce
Applause, n. The echo of a platitude.--Ambrose Bierce
Bigot, n. One who is obstinately and zealously attached to an opinion that you do not entertain.--Ambrose Bierce
Love, n. A temporary insanity curable by marriage.--Ambrose Bierce
Saint, n. A dead sinner revised and edited.--Ambrose Bierce
Death is not the end. There remains the litigation over the estate.--Ambrose Bierce
The Death of Class
I am his Highness' dog at Kew;
Pray tell me, sir, whose dog are you?
--Alexander Pope
He first deceased; she for a little tried
To live without him, liked it not, and died."
--Sir Henry Wotton (1568-1639), on the death of Sir Albert Morton's wife
Her whole life is an epigram: smack smooth, and neatly penned,
Platted quite neat to catch applause, with a sliding noose at the end.
--William Blake
Errors and Terrors
Treason doth never prosper; what's the reason?
For if it prosper, none dare call it treason.
--Sir John Harrington
The Errors of a Wise Man make your Rule
Rather than the Perfections of a Fool.
--William Blake
Bigotry is the sacred disease.--Heraclitus
A Brief Take on Blake
Those who restrain desire, do so because theirs is weak enough to be restrained.--William Blake
Improvement makes strait roads, but the crooked roads without improvement
are the roads of Genius.--William Blake
To see a World in a grain of sand
And a Heaven in a wild flower,
Hold Infinity in the palm of your hand
And Eternity in an hour.
--William Blake
I was angry with my friend,
I told my wrath, my wrath did end;
I was angry with my foe,
I told it not, my wrath did grow.
--William Blake
Type Cast
a politician is an arse upon
which everyone has sat except a man
--e. e. cummings
This Humanist whom no beliefs constrained
Grew so broad-minded he was scatter-brained.
--J. V. Cunningham
A Word to the Wise, by the Wordwise
It is Homer who has chiefly taught other poets the art of telling lies
skillfully.--Aristotle
Poetry comes nearer to vital truth than history.--Plato
Man does not live by words alone, despite the fact that sometimes he has to eat them. --Adlai Stevenson
Be not too tame neither, but
Let your own discretion be your tutor.
Suit the action to the word,
The word to the action.
--William Shakespeare, "Hamlet"
Art Smart
Obstacles cannot crush me. Every obstacle yields to stern resolve. He who
is fixed to a star does not change his mind. --Leonardo da Vinci
Each has his past shut in him like the leaves of a book known to him by heart and his
friends can only read the title.--Virginia Woolf
Fantasy, abandoned by reason, produces impossible monsters; united with it, she is
the mother of the arts and the origin of marvels.--Francisco Goya
Sagely Aging
Old age ain't no place for sissies.--Bette Davis
Living's a pain in the butt.--Jack LaLane
I can't afford to die. It would wreck my image.--Jack LaLane
Being "over the hill" is much better than being under it.-- Unknown
The reward of suffering is experience. -- Aeschylus
This ignorance upon my tongue
Was once the 'wisdom' of the young.
--John Williams
I refuse to think of them as chin hairs. I think of them as stray eyebrows.--Janette Barber
Inside every older lady is a younger lady ... wondering what the hell happened.--Cora Harvey Armstrong
The hardest years in life are those between ten and seventy.--Helen Hayes
I try to take one day at a time ... but sometimes several days attack me at once.--Jennifer Whenifer
Every time I close the door on reality, it comes in through the windows.--Jennifer Whenifer
Some people are alive only because it's illegal to kill them.-- Unknown
Adults are just obsolete children.--Dr. Seuss
Live as to die tomorrow.
Learn as to live forever.
--Isadore of Seville
I like not only to be loved but also to be told that I am loved. The realm
of silence is large enough beyond the grave. This is the world of light and
speech. And I shall take leave to tell you that you are very dear.--George
Eliot
I expect to pass this way but once; any good therefore that I can do, or any
kindness that I can show to any fellow creature. Let me do it now. Let me
not defer or neglect it, for I shall not pass this way again.--Etienne Griellet
Oh God of dust and rainbows, help us see that without dust the rainbow would
not be.--Langston Hughes
Sports Shorts
You can observe a lot just by watching.--Yogi Berra
There are some people who, if they don't already know, you
can't tell 'em.--Yogi Berra
Nobody goes there anymore; it's too crowded.--Yogi Berra
The future ain't what it used to be.--Yogi Berra
So I'm ugly. So what? I never saw anyone hit with his face.--Yogi Berra
I didn't really say all the things I said.--Yogi Berra
A Smidgen of Religion
Sorrow looks back, worry looks around, faith looks up.--Unknown
Some people attend church three times in their lives: when they're hatched, when they're matched, and when they're dispatched.--Unknown
Prevent truth decay. Brush up on your Bible.--Unknown
God answers knee-mail.--Unknown
Don’t give up. Moses was once a basket case.-- Unknown
Forbidden fruit creates many jams.-- Unknown
If God were small enough for us to understand, he wouldn’t be big enough for us
to worship.-- Unknown
Heaven will not be as good as earth,
unless it bring with it
that sweet power to remember,
which is the Staple of Heaven--
here.
--Emily Dickinson
Believe nothing because it is written in books.
Believe nothing because wise men say it is so.
Believe nothing because it is religious doctrine.
Believe it only because you yourself know it to be true.
--Buddha
All that is is the result of what we have thought.--Buddha
Women and We Men (Wee Men?)
A man's got to do what a man's got to do. A woman must do what he can't.--Rhonda Hansome
Whatever women must do they must do twice as well as men to be thought half as good. Luckily, this is not difficult.--Charlotte Whitton
When women are depressed they either eat or go shopping. Men invade another country.--Elayne Boosler
In politics, if you want anything said, ask a man. If you want anything done, ask a woman.--Margaret Thatcher
Behind every successful man is a surprised woman.--Maryon Pearson
A male gynecologist is like an auto mechanic who never owned a car.--
Carrie Snow
The phrase "working mother" is redundant.--Jane Sellman
If high heels were so wonderful, men would still be wearing them.--Sue Grafton
I am a marvelous housekeeper. Every time I leave a man, I keep his house.--Zsa Zsa Gabor
I'm not going to vacuum 'til Sears makes one you can ride on.--Roseanne Barr
I'm not offended by all the dumb blonde jokes because I know I'm not dumb ...
and I'm also not blonde.--Dolly Parton
Sometimes I wonder if men and women really suit each other.
Perhaps they should live next door and just visit now and then.--Katherine Hepburn
A mother is a mother still,
The holiest thing alive.
--Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Miscellanea
Quoting one is plagiarism; quoting many is research.-- Unknown
Space is a dangerous place ... especially if it's between your ears! -- Unknown
Success comes in cans, not can't s. -- Unknown
It is easy when we are in prosperity to give advice to the afflicted. -- Aeschylus
Society is now one polished horde,
Formed of two mighty tribes, the Bores and Bored.
--Lord Byron
The most beautiful thing we can experience is the mysterious.
It is the source of all true art and all science.
He to whom this emotion is a stranger,
who can no longer pause to wonder and stand rapt in awe,
is as good as dead: his eyes are closed.
--Albert Einstein
This world is not conclusion;
A sequel stands beyond,
Invisible as music,
But positive, as sound.
--Emily Dickinson
Is all that we see or seem but a dream within a dream?--Edgar Allen Poe
The Moving Finger writes; and having writ,
Moves on; nor all your Piety nor Wit
Shall lure it back to cancel half a Line,
Nor all your Tears wash out a Word of it.
--lines from the "Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam of Naishapur"
Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.
--Langston Hughes
Life is like a journey, taken on a train
With a pair of travellers at each windowpane.
I may sit beside you all the journey through,
Or I may sit elsewhere, never knowing you.
But if fate should make me sit by your side,
Let's be pleasant travellers; it's so short a ride.
--Anonymous
Whoever fights monsters should see to it
That in the process he does not become a monster.
If you gaze for long into an abyss,
the abyss gazes also into you.
--Friedrich Nietzsche
You cannot learn to fly by flying.
First you must learn to walk, and to run, and to climb, and to dance.--Friedrich Nietzsche
We should consider every day lost on which we have not danced at least once.--Friedrich Nietzsche
The tragedy of life is not so much what men suffer but rather what they
miss.--Thomas Carlyle
Books may be burned and cities sacked,
but truth, like the yearning for freedom,
lives in the hearts of humble men.
--Franklin D. Roosevelt
When you come to the end of your rope, tie a knot and hang on.--Franklin D. Roosevelt
The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today.--Franklin D. Roosevelt
When the earth reclaims your limbs, then shall you truly dance.--Kahlil
Gibran
A thousand words will not leave so deep an impression as one deed.--Henrik
Ibsen
Words are, of course, the most powerful drug used by mankind.--Rudyard
Kipling
The world of knowledge takes a crazy turn
When teachers themselves are taught to learn.
--Bertolt Brecht
To speak of morals in art is to speak of legislature in sex.
Art is the sex of the imagination.
--George Jean Nathan
No sensible decision can be made any longer without taking into account not
only the world as it is, but the world as it will be.--Isaac Asimov
Keep your face to the sunshine and you cannot see the shadows.--Helen Keller
I may disagree with what you have to say, but I shall defend, to the death,
your right to say it.--Voltaire
To the living we owe respect
but to the dead we owe only the truth.
--Voltaire
Let others praise ancient times; I am glad I was born in these.--Ovid (43 B.C. - A.D. 18)
The past is history,
The future is a mystery
and now is a gift.
That's why we call it the present.
--Anonymous
If I have seen a little farther than others,
it is because I have stood on
the shoulders of giants.--Sir Isaac Newton
Life is real! life is earnest!
And the grave is not its goal;
Dust thou art, to dust returnest,
Was not spoken of the soul.
--Henry W. Longfellow
Lives of great men all remind us
We can make our lives sublime,
And departing, leave behind us
Footprints on the sands of time.
--Henry W. Longfellow
Let us, then, be up and doing,
With a heart for any fate;
Still achieving, still pursuing,
Learn to labour and to wait.
--Henry W. Longfellow
No one is so accursed by fate,
No one so utterly desolate,
But some heart, though unknown,
Responds unto his own.
--Henry W. Longfellow
The leaves of memory seemed to make
A mournful rustling in the dark.
--Henry W. Longfellow
The heights by great men reached and kept
Were not attained by sudden flight,
But they while their companions slept
Were toiling upward in the night.
--Henry W. Longfellow
All things come round to him who will but wait.--Henry W. Longfellow
I would rather be a superb meteor, every atom of me in magnificent glow,
than a sleepy and permanent planet.--Jack London
The hands that help are better far than the lips that pray.--Robert G. Ingersoll
Art is long, life is short.--Goethe
May you live all the days of your life.--Jonathan Swift
There is none so blind as they that won't see.--Jonathan Swift
They are never alone that are accompanied with noble thoughts.--Sir Philip Sidney
Knowledge comes, but wisdom lingers.--Alfred, Lord Tennyson
Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change.--Alfred, Lord Tennyson
We are ancients of the earth,
And in the morning of the times.
--Alfred, Lord Tennyson
But the tender grace of a day that is dead
Will never come back to me.
--Alfred, Lord Tennyson
But what am I?
An infant crying in the night:
An infant crying for the light:
And with no language but a cry.
--Alfred, Lord Tennyson
'Tis better to have loved and lost
Than never to have loved at all.
--Alfred, Lord Tennyson
So many worlds, so much to do,
So little done, such things to be.
--Alfred, Lord Tennyson
A thing of beauty is a joy for ever;
Its loveliness increases; it will never
Pass into nothingness; but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams, and health, and quiet breathing.
--John Keats
Beauty is truth, truth beauty, -- that is all
Ye know on earth, and all ye need to know.
--John Keats
Hear ye not the hum
Of mighty workings?
--John Keats
The poetry of earth is never dead.--John Keats
We look before and after,
And pine for what is not;
Our sincerest laughter
With some pain is fraught;
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.
--Percy Bysshe Shelley
Tell all the Truth but tell it slant
Success in Circuit lies
Too bright for our infirm Delight
Is Truth's superb surprise.
As Lightning to the Children eased
With explanation kind,
The Truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind.
--Emily Dickinson
Of all sad words of tongue or pen
The saddest are these: "It might have been!"
--John Greenleaf Whittier