FAMILIAR QUOTATIONS.

New Zealand Tablet, Volume III, Issue 127, 8 October 1875, Page 15

FAMILIAR QUOTATIONS.

Maky familiar quotations are, in tho majority of cases, ascribed to false sources, and -we find the happy thoughts of gifted authors slipping readily from our tongue ; but we have only a confused idea, if any, of -whose wit we are borrowing. How many of the eager questioners who have been met with " Ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies," know that the tantalizing response is a direct quotation from Goldsmith ? To him we arc also indebted for " These little things are great to little men." And in Goldsmith's "Hermit" we find, " Man wantß but little here below, nor wants that little long j" but earlier than that, Dr. Young had said in his " Night Thoughts " " Man wants but little, nor that little long." " All that glitters is not gold," is from Shaksporre. A question arose at a small party as to the origin of a line familiar to nearly every one })resent, " What shades we are, what shadows we pursue !" And after great diversity of opinion and considerable search it was found that "not one of the company had given the true source. It is from a speech of Edmund Burkes , delivered at Bristol, on declaring the poll in 1789. Pope is commonly, but unjustly, credited with the authorship of the popular quotation, " Immodest words admit of no defeuce, for want of decency is want of sense." Ib may be found in Lord Hoscommon's essay on Translated Verses, which is also the source of " Ohooso an author as you choose a friend." Daniel Defoe i§ quoted as the author of the proverb, ,' God no sooner builds a church than the devil puts up a chapel." Defoe wrote a poem, one verse of which was as follows : — Wherever God erects a house of prayer, The devil is sure to build a chapel there : And 'twill he found, upon examination, The latter has the largest congregation. But in writing this D< foe only versified a well-known proverb of his day. Burton, in his "Anatomy of: Melancholy, says : — "Where God hath a temple, the devil will have a chapel ; " and Herbert in his " Jacula Prudentum," expressed the same- idea. " Though the mills of God grind slowly, yet they grind exceedingly small." may be found among Longfellow's "Poetic Aphorisms," and is a translation from Fredrick von Logan, a writer of tbc 17th century. From Pope's rich stores of thought we gather many popular maxims. " Pleased with a rattle, tickled with a straw ; " " Whatever is, is right ; " " Order is Heaven's first law ; " " Honor and fame from no condition rise ; '' " .An honest man's the noblest work of G.»d,/ may bo found in Pope's "Essay on Man" In his "Essay on Criticism," "A little learning is a dangerous thing ; " " To err is human, to forgive divine ; " " Fools rush in where angels fear to t;ead ; " "Your ease in writing comes from art. not chance — as those move easiest who have learned to dance." The well-known line, "Well should you practise who so well can preach ; " occurs in his "Wife of Bath." There is an Italian proverb used in the extravagance of flattery expressive of this idea " When nature made tbec she broke the mould." Byron uses it in the closing lines of his monody on the death of Sheridau :—: — Sighing that nature formed hut one such man, Andvbrolte the die in moulding Sheridan. "We live in deeds, not years," "Life is but a means unto an end," and " All up-hill work when we would do, all down-hill work when we would suffer," are quotations from Bailey's " Festus." For some time there was considerable perplexity as to the origin of the familiar line, "Though lost to sight to memory dear/ but it has been finally settled that it originated with Huthven Jenkynes, and was first published in the Greenwich Magazines for Mariners, in 1701. "-Through thick and thin," "None but the brave deserve the fair," and " Death and death's half-brother sleep," are from Dryden. " 'Tis distance lends enchantment to the view," and "Like angels' visits, few and far between," arc from Campbell's " Pleasures of Hope." In a collection of old songs, published in the sixteenth century, we find "The darkest hour is just before the dawn." To those great storehouses of wise sayings, Shakespeare's works, the following owe their origin: "Double, doub'e, toil and trouble," "Curses not loud but .deep," "Make assurance doubly sure," "We shall not look upon his like again," and s-o many others that we find it dangerous with our limited space to even make a commencement. But while we owe a large debt of gratitude to Shakespeare, he usurps the credit of many good things others have written ; the line, '• a fellow-feeling makes one wondrous kind," being one instance. This was written •by Garrick in the occasional prologue spoken by him on leaving the stage. Scripture is often misquoted as fckakespeare, and vice versa, probably because Shakespeare was indebted to the Scriptures for many of his illustrations, and in reading his works we are frequently reminded of the Bible — not so much by a decided imitation of style as by an elevation of thought and simplicity of speech not found elsewhero. . " The good die first, and they whose hearts arc dry as summer dust burn to the socket/ is from Wordsworth's " Excursion." "Blessings brighten as they take their fiiglit," from Young's "Night Thoughts." God made the country and man made the town," from Cowpcr's "Task," which is also the source of "The cup that cheers, hut not inebriates," and the oft-quoted lino, " Not much the worse of wear." Cougreve, in his play of the "Old Bachelor," gives us " Married in haste, we may "repent at leisure ; " and " Music hath charms to soothe the savage breast/ is by the same author, and occurs in his " Mourning Bride." " Whore ignomnce is bliss, 'tis folly to be •wise," is in Grey'n Odo ou Eton College. " Christmas comes but once a year," and " It's an ill that blows nobody any good," were ■written by Thomas Tussor in 1580. " Straws show which way the ■wind blows," by James Chatham, and"Oubof sight out of mind," by Lord Brookr,