Modesty is a quality in a lover more praised by the women than liked.

About Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Richard Brinsley Butler Sheridanwas an Anglo-Irish playwright, writer and Whig politician who sat in the British House of Commons from 1780 to 1812, representing the constituencies of Stafford, Westminster and Ilchester. The owner of the Theatre Royal, Drury Lane in London, he wrote several prominent plays such as The Rivalsand A Trip to Scarborough (1777).

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More quotes from Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Fertilizer does no good in a heap, but a little spread around works miracles all over.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

I’m called away by particular business – but I leave my character behind me.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

Conscience has no more to do with gallantry than it has with politics.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

For if there is anything to one’s praise, it is foolish vanity to be gratified at it, and if it is abuse – why one is always sure to hear of it from one damned good-natured friend or another!

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

There is not a passion so strongly rooted in the human heart as envy.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

Modesty is a quality in a lover more praised by the women than liked.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

There’s no possibility of being witty without a little ill-nature.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

Pity those who nature abuses; never those who abuse nature.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

Those that vow the most are the least sincere.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

Death’s a debt; his mandamus binds all alike- no bail, no demurrer.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

The glorious uncertainty of the law was a thing well known and complained of, by all ignorant people, but all learned gentleman considered it as its greatest excellency.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

You know it is not my interest to pay the principal, or my principal to pay the interest.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

Certainly nothing is unnatural that is not physically impossible.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

Won’t you come into the garden? I would like my roses to see you.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

You write with ease to show your breeding, but easy writing’s curst hard reading.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

I mean, the question actors most often get asked is how they can bear saying the same things over and over again, night after night, but God knows the answer to that is, don’t we all anyway; might as well get paid for it.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

There is nothing on earth so easy as to forget, if a person chooses to set about it. I’m sure I have as much forgot your poor, dear uncle, as if he had never existed; and I thought it my duty to do so.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

Be just before you are generous.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

That old man dies prematurely whose memory records no benefits conferred. They only have lived long who have lived virtuously.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

A bumper of good liquor will end a contest quicker than justice, judge, or vicar.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

A fluent tongue is the only thing a mother don’t like her daughter to resemble her in.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

The surest way to fail is not to determine to succeed.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

My valor is certainly going, it is sneaking off! I feel it oozing out as it were, at the palms of my hands!

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

Remember that when you meet your antagonist, to do everything in a mild agreeable manner. Let your courage be keen, but, at the same time, as polished as your sword.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

To smile at the jest which plants a thorn in another’s breast is to become a principal in the mischief.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

Ay, ay, the best terms will grow obsolete: damns have had their day.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

I open with a clock striking, to beget an awful attention in the audience – it also marks the time, which is four o clock in the morning, and saves a description of the rising sun, and a great deal about gilding the eastern hemisphere.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

He is indebted to his memory for his jests and to his imagination for his facts.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

‘Tis safest in matrimony to begin with a little aversion.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

The number of those who undergo the fatigue of judging for themselves is very small indeed.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)

Do thou snatch treasures from my lips, and I’ll take kingdoms back from thine.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan

Irish-British politician, playwright and writer (1751-1816)