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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?

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Romance

More quotes by Ben Jonson

The world knows only two, — that's Rome and I.

Sejanus (1603)

Drink to me only with thine eyes,
And I will pledge with mine;
Or leave a kiss but in the cup
And I'll not look for wine.

The Works of Ben Jonson, First Folio (1616)

There's reason good, that you good laws should make:
Men's manners ne'er were viler, for your sake.

The Works of Ben Jonson, First Folio (1616)

Neither do thou lust after that tawney weed tobacco.

True happiness
Consists not in the multitude of friends,
But in the worth and choice.

Cynthia's Revels (1600)

All Ben Jonson quotes →

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Sigh no more, ladies, sigh no more,
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She's beautiful, and therefore to be woo'd;
She is a woman, therefore to be won.

William Shakespeare Henry VI, Part 1 (1592)

Romance requires trust—and the deeper the trust, the deeper the possibility for romance.

Jordan Peterson Beyond Order (2021)

The surest way to hit a woman’s heart is to take aim kneeling.

Douglas William Jerrold

Attribution

Quote text and notes from Wikiquote: Ben Jonson (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0. Source quality and labels are our own summary of what Wikiquote records.