Samuel Butler est un poète anglais. Parmi ses œuvres, caractéristiques de la littérature de la Restauration anglaise, on se souvient principalement de Hudibras, un long poème satirique et burlesque sur le puritanisme. Wikipedia
“Quoth Hudibras, "I smell a rat!
Ralpho, thou dost prevaricate."”
Canto I, line 821
Source: Hudibras, Part I (1663–1664)
Canto I, line 1495
Source: Hudibras, Part III (1678)
“There are more fools than knaves in the world, else the knaves would not have enough to live upon.”
The Genuine Remains in Verse and Prose of Mr. Samuel Butler (1759), edited by Robert Thyer
“Doubtless the pleasure is as great
Of being cheated as to cheat.”
Canto III, line 1
Source: Hudibras, Part II (1664)
Canto III, line 1047
Source: Hudibras, Part I (1663–1664)
“While the honour thou hast got
Is spick and span new.”
Canto III, line 398
Source: Hudibras, Part I (1663–1664)
Canto II, line 29
Source: Hudibras, Part II (1664)
“To swallow gudgeons ere they 're catch'd,
And count their chickens ere they're hatch'd.”
Canto III, line 923
Source: Hudibras, Part II (1664)
Canto III, line 624
Source: Hudibras, Part III (1678)
“Why should not conscience have vacation
As well as other courts o' th' nation?”
Canto II, line 317
Source: Hudibras, Part II (1664)
Canto I, line 1277
Source: Hudibras, Part III (1678)
“With many a stiff thwack, many a bang,
Hard crab-tree and old iron rang.”
Canto II, line 831
Source: Hudibras, Part I (1663–1664)
“But still his tongue ran on, the less
Of weight it bore, with greater ease.”
Canto II, line 443
Source: Hudibras, Part III (1678)
Canto II, line 501
Source: Hudibras, Part II (1664)
“For those that fly may fight again,
Which he can never do that's slain.”
Canto III, line 243
Source: Hudibras, Part III (1678)
“Love is a boy by poets styl'd;
Then spare the rod and spoil the child.”
Canto I, line 843
Source: Hudibras, Part II (1664)
“Where entity and quiddity,
The ghosts of defunct bodies, fly.”
Canto I, line 145
Source: Hudibras, Part I (1663–1664)
“Quoth she, I 've heard old cunning stagers
Say fools for arguments use wagers.”
Canto I, line 297
Source: Hudibras, Part II (1664)
“Who thought he 'd won
The field as certain as a gun.”
Canto III, line 11
Source: Hudibras, Part I (1663–1664)
“Like feather bed betwixt a wall
And heavy brunt of cannon ball.”
Canto II, line 872
Source: Hudibras, Part I (1663–1664)
“For truth is precious and divine,—
Too rich a pearl for carnal swine.”
Canto II, line 257
Source: Hudibras, Part II (1664)
Canto II, line 377.
Source: Hudibras, Part II (1664)
“There 's but the twinkling of a star
Between a man of peace and war.”
Canto III, line 957
Source: Hudibras, Part II (1664)
Prose Observations (Oxford: 1979), p. 4
“He knew what 's what, and that 's as high
As metaphysic wit can fly.”
Canto I, line 149
Source: Hudibras, Part I (1663–1664)
Canto I, line 51
Source: Hudibras, Part I (1663–1664)
