William Maginn Quotes

There is no such thing as female genius.

It is singular that scarcely any tailor who can make a coat well, can make pantaloons.

In order to know what cod really is, you must eat it in Newfoundland.

We moderns are perhaps inferior to our ancestors in nothing more than in our epitaphs.

No cigar-smoker ever committed suicide.

The wight can tell </br> A melancholy and a merry tale </br> Of field, and fight, and chief, and lady gay.

Ass-milk, they say, tastes exceedingly like woman's. No wonder.

A band of gallant souls, who knew </br> The olive wood, the mountain blue, </br> The ration rum, the biscuit black, </br> The long bleak road, the bivouac, </br> The cannon's thunder, and the bays </br> That wave o'er glorious victories, </br> Better than city's midnight dress, </br> Her luxuries, and gaudiness.

The best of all pies is a grouse-pie.

If prudes were as pure as they would have us believe, they would not rail so bitterly as they do. We do not thoroughly hate that which we do not thoroughly understand.

Marrying girls is a nice matter always; for they are as cautious as crows plundering a corn-field. ... I don't myself, I profess, upon principle, see any objection to marrying a widow. ... If a woman, however, has had more than three husbands, she poisons them: avoid her.

People may talk as they like, but after all, London is London.

In literature and in love we generally begin in bad taste.

Whenever you see a book frequently advertised, you may be pretty sure it is a bad one. If you see a puff quoted in the advertisement, you may be quite sure.

In general, in-door prospects are the best. What purling brook matches the music of my gurgling bottle? What is an old roofless cathedral compared to a well-built pie?