POLONIUS

COLLECTION OF WISE SAWS
AND MODERN INSTANCES

BY

EDWARD FITZGERALD

Therefore, since brevity is the soul of wit,
teciousness the limbs and outward flourishes,
I WILL BE BRIEF.

AN

METHUEN & CO.

LONDON

ING

NOS

NOTE

THIS Issue is founded on the First Edition, published by W. Pickering

in 1852.

PREFACE

FEW
'EW books are duller than books
of Aphorisms and Apophthegms.
A Jest-book is, proverbially, no
joke; a Wit-book, perhaps, worse;
but dullest of all, probably, is the
Moral-book, which this little volume
pretends to be. So with men: the
Jester, the Wit, and the Moralist,
each wearisome in proportion as each
deals exclusively in his one commod-
ity. "Too much of one thing," says
Fuller, "is good for nothing.

Apophthegms

seem to

Bacon's "
me the best collection of many men's
sayings; the greatest variety of wis-
dom, good sense, wit, humour, and
even simple "naiveté," (as one must
call it for want of a native word,)
all told in a style whose dignity and
antiquity (together with perhaps our
secret consciousness of the gravity
and even tragic greatness of the nar-
rator) add a particular humour to the
lighter stories.

3740 .7

27

iii

(RECAP

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