Ben Jonson
Ben Jonson
Benjamin "Ben" Jonsonwas an English playwright, poet, actor and literary critic of the 17th century, whose artistry exerted a lasting impact upon English poetry and stage comedy. He popularised the comedy of humours. He is best known for the satirical plays Every Man in His Humour, Volpone, or The Foxe, The Alchemistand Bartholomew Fayre: A Comedyand for his lyric poetry; he is generally regarded as the second most important English dramatist, after William Shakespeare, during the reign of James I...
NationalityEnglish
ProfessionPoet
Date of Birth11 June 1572
My thoughts and I were of another world.
As it is a great point of art, when our matter requires it, to enlarge and veer out all sail, so to take it in and contract it is of no less praise when the argument doth ask it.
Forbear, you things That stand upon the pinnacles of state, To boast your slippery height! when you do fall, You dash yourselves in pieces, ne'er to rise: And he that lends you pity, is not wise.
Silence in woman is like speech in man.
I would rather have a plain down-right wisdom than a foolish and affected eloquence.
To men pressed by their wants all change is ever welcome.
Weigh the meaning and look not at the words.
Opinion is a light, vain, crude, and imperfect thing.
No man is so foolish but may give another good counsel sometimes; and no man is so wise, but may easily err, if he will take no others counsel but his own. But very few men are wise by their own counsel; or learned by their own teaching. For he that was only taught by himself had a fool to his master.
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.
It is an art to have so much judgment as to apparel a lie well, to give it a good dressing.
A lily of a day Is fairer far in May, Although it fall and die that night, It was the plant and flower of light. In small proportions we just beauties see, And in short measures life may perfect be.
Nor use too swelling, or ill-sounded words . . . .
Confound these ancestors... They've stolen our best ideas!