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Read Ebook: Familiar Quotations A Collection of Passages Phrases and Proverbs Traced to Their Sources in Ancient and Modern Literature by Bartlett John Compiler
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Ebook has 11070 lines and 984128 words, and 222 pages
FAMILIAR QUOTATIONS:
A COLLECTION OF
PASSAGES, PHRASES, AND PROVERBS
TRACED TO THEIR SOURCES IN
ANCIENT AND MODERN LITERATURE
BY JOHN BARTLETT.
"I have gathered a posie of other men's flowers, and nothing but the thread that binds them is mine own."
NINTH EDITION.
BOSTON: LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. 1905.
UNIVERSITY PRESS: JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE, U.S.A.
THIS EDITION IS AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED TO THE MEMORY OF THE LATE ASSISTANT EDITOR,
REZIN A. WIGHT.
PREFACE
"Out of the old fieldes cometh al this new corne fro yere to yere," And out of the fresh woodes cometh al these new flowres here.
THE small thin volume, the first to bear the title of this collection, after passing through eight editions, each enlarged, now culminates in its ninth,--and with it, closes its tentative life.
This extract from the Preface of the fourth edition is applicable to the present one:--
"It is not easy to determine in all cases the degree of familiarity that may belong to phrases and sentences which present themselves for admission; for what is familiar to one class of readers may be quite new to another. Many maxims of the most famous writers of our language, and numberless curious and happy turns from orators and poets, have knocked at the door, and it was hard to deny them. But to admit these simply on their own merits, without assurance that the general reader would readily recognize them as old friends, was aside from the purpose of this collection. Still, it has been thought better to incur the risk of erring on the side of fulness."
With the many additions to the English writers, the present edition contains selections from the French, and from the wit and wisdom of the ancients. A few passages have been admitted without a claim to familiarity, but solely on the ground of coincidence of thought.
I am under great obligations to M. H. MORGAN, Ph. D., of Harvard University, for the translation of Marcus Aurelius, and for the translation and selections from the Greek tragic writers. I am indebted to the kindness of Mr. DANIEL W. WILDER, of Kansas, for the quotations from Pilpay, with contributions from Diogenes Laertius, Montaigne, Burton, and Pope's Homer; to Dr. WILLIAM J. ROLFE for quotations from Robert Browning; to Mr. JAMES W. MCINTYRE for quotations from Coleridge, Shelley, Keats, Mrs. Browning, Robert Browning, and Tennyson. And I have incurred other obligations to friends for here a little and there a little.
It gives me pleasure to acknowledge the great assistance I have received from Mr. A. W. STEVENS, the accomplished reader of the University Press, as this work was passing through the press.
In withdrawing from this very agreeable pursuit, I beg to offer my sincere thanks to all who have assisted me either in the way of suggestions or by contributions; and especially to those lovers of this subsidiary literature for their kind appreciation of former editions.
Accepted by scholars as an authoritative book of reference, it has grown with its growth in public estimation with each reissue. Of the last two editions forty thousand copies were printed, apart from the English reprints. The present enlargement of text equals three hundred and fifty pages of the previous edition, and the index is increased with upwards of ten thousand lines.
CAMBRIDGE, March, 1891.
INGRAM, JOHN K. 681 IRVING, WASHINGTON 536
ANONYMOUS BOOKS CITED.
FAMILIAR QUOTATIONS.
GEOFFREY CHAUCER. 1328-1400.
WHANNE that April with his shoures sote The droughte of March hath perced to the rote.
And smale foules maken melodie, That slepen alle night with open eye, So priketh hem nature in hir corages; Than longen folk to gon on pilgrimages.
And of his port as meke as is a mayde.
He was a veray parfit gentil knight.
He coude songes make, and wel endite.
Ful wel she sange the service devine, Entuned in hire nose ful swetely; And Frenche she spake ful fayre and fetisly, After the scole of Stratford atte bowe, For Frenche of Paris was to hire unknowe.
A Clerk ther was of Oxenforde also.
For him was lever han at his beddes hed A twenty bokes, clothed in black or red, Of Aristotle, and his philosophie, Than robes riche, or fidel, or sautrie. But all be that he was a philosophre, Yet hadde he but litel gold in cofre.
And gladly wolde he lerne, and gladly teche.
Nowher so besy a man as he ther n' as, And yet he semed besier than he was.
His studie was but litel on the Bible.
For gold in phisike is a cordial; Therefore he loved gold in special.
Wide was his parish, and houses fer asonder.
This noble ensample to his shepe he yaf,-- That first he wrought, and afterwards he taught.
But Cristes lore, and his apostles twelve, He taught; but first he folwed it himselve.
And yet he had a thomb of gold parde.
Who so shall telle a tale after a man, He moste reherse, as neighe as ever he can, Everich word, if it be in his charge, All speke he never so rudely and so large; Or elles he moste tellen his tale untrewe, Or feinen thinges, or finden wordes newe.
For May wol have no slogardie a-night. The seson priketh every gentil herte, And maketh him out of his slepe to sterte.
That field hath eyen, and the wood hath ears.
Up rose the sonne, and up rose Emelie.
Min be the travaille, and thin be the glorie.
To maken vertue of necessite.
And brought of mighty ale a large quart.
Ther n' is no werkman whatever he be, That may both werken wel and hastily. This wol be done at leisure parfitly.
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