John Bartlett (1820–1905). Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. 1919.
3585 Alexander Pope 1688-1744 John Bartlett
| NUMBER: | 3585 |
| AUTHOR: | Alexander Pope (1688–1744) |
| QUOTATION: | A wit with dunces, and a dunce with wits. 1 |
| ATTRIBUTION: | The Dunciad. Book iv. Line 90. |
| Note 1. See Shakespeare, King Henry V, Quotation 31. This man [Chesterfield], I thought, had been a lord among wits; but I find he is only a wit among lords.—Samuel Johnson (Boswell’s Life): vol. ii. ch. i. A fool with judges, amongst fools a judge.—William Cowper: Conversation, line 298. Although too much of a soldier among sovereigns, no one could claim with better right to be a sovereign among soldiers.—Sir Walter Scott: Life of Napoleon. He [Steele] was a rake among scholars, and a scholar among rakes.—Thomas B. Macaulay: Review of Aikin’s Life of Addison. Temple was a man of the world among men of letters, a man of letters among men of the world.—Thomas B. Macaulay: Review of Life and Writings of Sir William Temple. Greswell in his “Memoirs of Politian” says that Sannazarius himself, inscribing to this lady [Cassandra Marchesia] an edition of his Italian Poems, terms her “delle belle eruditissima, delle erudite bellissima” (most learned of the fair; fairest of the learned). Qui stultis videri eruditi volunt stulti eruditis videntur (Those who wish to appear wise among fools, among the wise seem foolish).—Quintilian, x. 7. 22. [back] |