John Vanbrugh Quotes & Sayings

Good manners and soft words have brought many a difficult thing to pass. — John Vanbrugh

Virtue is its own reward. There's a pleasure in doing good which sufficiently pays itself. — John Vanbrugh

We gentlemen, whose chariot's roll only upon the four aces, are apt to have a wheel out of order. — John Vanbrugh

You may build castles in the air, and fume, and fret, and grow thin and lean, and pale and ugly, if you please. But I tell you, no man worth having is true to his wife, or can be true to his wife, or ever was, or will be so. — John Vanbrugh

Friendship's said to be a plant of tedious growth, its root composed of tender fibers, nice in their taste, cautious in spreading. — John Vanbrugh

Thinking is to me the greatest fatigue in the world. — John Vanbrugh

Repentance for past crimes is just and easy; but sin-no-more's a task too hard for mortals — John Vanbrugh

Shield me, kind heaven, what an inundation of impertinence is here coming upon us! — John Vanbrugh

We're gaily yet, we're gaily yet,
And we're not very fow, but we're gaily yet;
Then set ye awhile, and tipple a bit,
For we's not very fow, but we're gaily yet. — John Vanbrugh

If women were humbler, men would be more honest. — John Vanbrugh

Custom is the law of fools. — John Vanbrugh

Love, like virtue, is its own reward. — John Vanbrugh

When debtors once have borrowed all we have to lend, they are very apt to grow shy of their creditors' company. — John Vanbrugh

Custom, madam, is the law of fools, but it shall never govern me. — John Vanbrugh

The want of a thing is perplexing enough, but the possession of it is intolerable. — John Vanbrugh

How I should despise such a thing if I were a man. What a nose she has! what a chin! what a neck! Then her eyes
and the worst kissing lips in the universe. — John Vanbrugh

Once a woman has given you her heart, you can never get rid of the rest of her. — John Vanbrugh

Love's like virtue, its own reward. — John Vanbrugh

True virtue, wheresoever it moves, still carries an intrinsic worth about it. — John Vanbrugh

No man is worth having is true to his wife, or can be true to his wife, or ever was, or ever will be so. — John Vanbrugh

As if a woman of education bought things because she wanted 'em. — John Vanbrugh

Let our weakness be what it will, mankind will still be weaker; and whilst there is a world, 'tis woman that will govern it. — John Vanbrugh

Tho marriage be a lottery in which there are a wondrous many blanks, yet there is one inestimable lot in which the only heaven on earth is written. — John Vanbrugh