Page:Hoyt's New Cyclopedia Of Practical Quotations (1922).djvu/42

1

At first laying down, as a fact fundamental,
That nothing with God can be accidental.

Longfellow—Christus. The Golden Legend. Pt. VI.

2

By many a happy accident.

Thomas Middleton—No Wit, no Help, like a Woman's. Act IV. Sc. 1.

(See also Goldsmith)

3

Was der Ameise Vernunft mühsam zu Haufen schleppt, jagt in einem Hui der Wind des Zufalls zusammen.

What the reason of the ant laboriously drags into a heap, the wind of accident will collect in one breath.

Schiller—Fiesco. Act II. Sc. 4.

4

I have shot mine arrow o'er the house
And hurt my brother.

Hamlet. Act V. Sc. 2. L. 254.

5

Moving accidents by flood and field.

Othello. Act I. Sc. 3. L. 135.

6

A happy accident.

Madame de Staël—L'Allemagne. Ch. XVI.

(See also Goldsmith)

7

The accident of an accident.

Lord Thurlow—Speech in reply to Lord Grafton.

8

The chapter of accidents is the longest chapter in the book.

 Attributed to John Wilkes by Southey—The Doctor. Ch. CXVIII.

(See also Burke)

ACTING; THE STAGE

(See also World)

9

Farce follow'd Comedy, and reach'd her prime,
In ever-laughing Foote's fantastic time;
Mad wag! who pardon'd none, nor spared the best,
And turn'd some very serious things to jest.
Nor church nor state escaped his public sneers,
Arms nor the gown, priests, lawyers, volunteers;
"Alas, poor Yorick!" now forever mute!
Whoever loves a laugh must sigh for Foote.
We smile, perforce, when histrionic scenes
Ape the swoln dialogue of kings and queens,
When "Chrononhotonthologos must die,"
And Arthur struts in mimic majesty.

Byron—Hints from Horace. L. 329.

10

As good as a play.

 Saying ascribed to Charles II. while listening to a debate on Lord Ross's Divorce Bill.

11

But as for all the rest,
There's hardly one (I may say none) who stands the Artist's test.
The Artist is a rare, rare breed. There were but two, forsooth,
In all me time (the stage's prime!) and The
Other One was Booth.

Edmund Vance Cooke—The Other One was Booth.

12

I think I love and reverence all arts equally, only putting my own just above the others; because in it I recognize the union and culmination of my own. To me it seems as if when God conceived the world, that was Poetry; He formed it, and that was Sculpture; He colored it, and that was Painting; He peopled it with living beings, and that was the grand, divine, eternal Drama.

Charlotte Cushman.

13

See, how these rascals use me! They will not

let my play run; and yet they steal my thunder.

John Dennis See Biographia Britannica. Vol. V. P. 103.

14

Like hungry guests, a sitting audience looks:
Plays are like suppers; poets are the cooks.
The founder's you: the table is this place:
The carvers we: the prologue is the grace.
Each act, a course, each scene, a different dish,
Though we're in Lent. I doubt you're still for flesh.
Satire's the sauce, high-season'd, sharp and rough.
Kind masks and beaux, I hope you're pepper-proof?
Wit is the wine; but 'tis so scarce the true
Poets, like vintners, balderdash and brew.
Your surly scenes, where rant and bloodshed join.
Are butcher's meat, a battle's sirloin:
Your scenes of love, so flowing, soft and chaste,
Are water-gruel without salt or taste.

George Farquhar—The Inconstant; or, The Way to Win Him. Prologue.

15

Prologues precede the piece in mournful verse,
As undertakers walk before the hearse.

David Garrick—Apprentice. Prologue.

16

Prologues like compliments are loss of time;
'Tis penning bows and making legs in rhyme.

David Garrick—Prologue to Crisp's Tragedy of Virginia.

17

On the stage he was natural, simple, affecting,
'Twas only that when he was off, he was acting.

Goldsmith—Retaliation. L. 101.

18

Everybody has his own theatre, in which he is manager, actor, prompter, playwright, sceneshifter, boxkeeper, doorkeeper, all in one, and audience into the bargain.

J. C. and A. W. Hare—Guesses at Truth.

19

It's very hard! Oh, Dick, my boy,
It's very hard one can't enjoy
A little private spouting;
But sure as Lear or Hamlet lives,
Up comes our master, Bounce! and gives
The tragic Muse a routing.

Hood—The Stage-Struck Hero.