Semiotics

"True wit is nature to advantage dress'd, What oft was thought, but ne'er so well expressed."

"If faith itself has different dresses worn, What wonder modes in wit should take their turn?"

"How the wit brightens! how the style refines!"

"So modest plainness sets off sprightly wit, For works may have more wit than does 'em good, As bodies perish through excess of blood."

"For wit and judgment often are at strife, Though meant each other's aid, like man and wife."

"There's a hell of a distance between wise-cracking and wit. Wit has truth in it; wise-cracking is simply calisthenics with words."

"Wit: a form of sex display."

"On peut dire que son esprit brille aux dépens de sa mèmoire."

"After all, wit is something like sunshine in a frost—very sharp, very bright, but very cold and uncomfortable."

"To the many, witticisms not only require to be explained, like riddles, but are also like new shoes, which people require to wear many times before they get accustomed to them."

"He must be a dull Fellow indeed, whom neither Love, Malice, nor Necessity, can inspire with Wit."

"This man [Chesterfield] I thought had been a lord among wits; but I find he is only a wit among lords."

"Wit's an unruly engine, wildly striking Sometimes a friend, sometimes the engineer: Hast thou the knack? pamper it not with liking; But if thou want it, buy it not too deare Many affecting wit beyond their power, Have got to be a deare fool for an houre."

"As a wit, if not first, in the very first line."

"Their heads sometimes so little that there is no room for wit; sometimes so long, that there is no wit for so much room."

"Great wits are sure to madness near allied, And thin partitions do their bounds divide."

"His wit invites you by his looks to come, But when you knock, it never is at home."

"Great wits and valours, like great states, Do sometimes sink with their own weights."

"We grant, although he had much wit, H' was very shy of using it, As being loth to wear it out, And therefore bore it not about; Unless on holy days or so, As men their best apparel do."

"Aristotle said * * * melancholy men of all others are most witty."

"Essere la natura de' motti cotale, che essi come la pecora morde deono cosi mordere l'uditore, e non come 'l cane: percio che, se come cane mordesse il motto, non sarebbe motto, ma villania."

"WITTICISM, n. A sharp and clever remark, usually quoted, and seldom noted; what the Philistine is pleased to call a "joke.""

"WIT, n. The salt with which the American humorist spoils his intellectual cookery by leaving it out."

"For when the wine is in, the wit is out."

"I understand. We all have to honor our vows. To the living and to the dead."

"Ay, springes to catch woodcocks. I do know When the blood burns, how prodigal the soul Lends the tongue vows."

"Let us embrace, and from this very moment Vow an eternal misery together."

"Ease would recant Vows made in pain, as violent and void."

"Vows with so much passion, swears with so much grace, That 'tis a kind of Heaven to be deluded by him."

"Oh, why should vows so fondly made, Be broken ere the morrow, To one who loves as never maid Loved in this world of sorrow?"

"Better is it that thou shouldest not vow, than that thou shouldest vow and not pay."

"Vow me no vows."

"Two voices are there; one is of the sea, One of the mountains: each a mighty Voice."

"And rolling far along the gloomy shores The voice of days of old and days to be."

"Vox nihil aliud quam ictus aer."

"A sweet voice, a little indistinct and muffled, which caresses and does not thrill; an utterance which glides on without emphasis, and lays stress only on what is deeply felt."

"Her voice was like the voice the stars Had when they sang together."

"A Locanian having plucked all the feathers off from a nightingale and seeing what a little body it had, "surely," quoth he, "thou art all voice and nothing else." (Vox et præterea nihil)."

"How sweetly sounds the voice of a good woman! It is so seldom heard that, when it speaks, It ravishes all senses."

"Her silver voice Is the rich music of a summer bird, Heard in the still night, with its passionate cadence."

"Thy voice Is a celestial melody."

"Oh, there is something in that voice that reaches The innermost recesses of my spirit!"

"The voice so sweet, the words so fair, As some soft chime had stroked the air; And though the sound had parted thence, Still left an echo in the sense."

"He ceased: but left so charming on their ear His voice, that listening still they seemed to hear."

"Her voice changed like a bird's: There grew more of the music, and less of the words."

"The voice of one crying out in the desert."

"Vōx clāmantis in dēsertō."

"A still, small voice."

"His voice was as the sound of many waters."

"In the timbre of a woman's voice, when it is beautiful, there seem to be mysteriously harmonised all the desires and enchantments both of the spirit and the body."