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Ben Jonson Quotes

1572–1637 England

Benjamin Jonson (11 June 1572 – 6 August 1637) was an English Renaissance dramatist, poet and actor, most famous for his plays Volpone and The Alchemist, his lyrics, his influence on Jacobean and Caroline poets, his theory of humours, his contentious personality, and his friendship and rivalry with William Shakespeare.

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Also known as: Jonson, Ben

Random Ben Jonson quote

126 quotes

Follow a shadow, it still flies you,
Seem to fly, it will pursue:
So court a mistress, she denies you;
Let her alone, she will court you.
Say are not women truly, then,
Styled but the shadows of us men?

It is not growing like a tree
In bulk, doth make man better be;
Or standing long an oak, three hundred year,
To fall a log, dry, bald and sere:
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.

The Works of Ben Jonson, Second Folio (1640)

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.

The Works of Ben Jonson, Second Folio (1640)

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.

The Works of Ben Jonson, Second Folio (1640)

Act i, Scene 3. Comparable to "Hang sorrow! care will kill a cat", George Wither, "Poem on Christmas"

Every Man in His Humour (1598)

Of Pan we sing, the best of leaders Pan,
That leads the Naiads and the Dryads forth;
And to their dances more than Hermes can,
Hear, O you groves, and hills resound his worth.

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: Ben Jonson (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.