Marriage Quotes & Sayings (Husbands, Wives, Marriages, Divorce, Being Married, Marital, etc) What a happy and holy fashion it is that those who love one another should rest on the same pillow. ~Nathaniel Hawthorne The older I get, the less time I want to spend with the part of the human race that didn't marry me. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com What greater thing is there for two human souls, than to feel that they are joined for life — to strengthen each other in all labour, to rest on each other in all sorrow, to minister to each other in all pain, to be one with each other in silent unspeakable memories at the moment of the last parting? ~George Eliot (1819–1880), Adam Bede, 1859 Strike an average between what a woman thinks of her husband a month before she marries him and what she thinks of him a year afterward, and you will have the truth about him. ~H.L. Mencken, A Book of Burlesques, 1916 The bonds of matrimony are like any other bonds — they mature slowly.

~Peter De Vries To keep the fire burning brightly there's one easy rule: Keep the two logs together, near enough to keep each other warm and far enough apart — about a finger's breadth — for breathing room. Good fire, good marriage, same rule. ~Marnie Reed Crowell I love being married. It's so great to find that one special person you want to annoy for the rest of your life. ~Rita Rudner Marriage, n. A community consisting of a master, a mistress, and two slaves, making in all two. ~Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, 1911 Marriage is an alliance entered into by a man who can't sleep with the window shut, and a woman who can't sleep with the window open. ~George Bernard Shaw Newlyweds become oldyweds, and oldyweds are the reasons that families work. ~Author Unknown Chains do not hold a marriage together. It is threads, hundreds of tiny threads which sew people together through the years. ~Simone Signoret Success in marriage does not come merely through finding the right mate, but through being the right mate. ~Barnett R.

Brickner A long marriage is two people trying to dance a duet and two solos at the same time. ~Anne Taylor Fleming Woke up in bed with a gorgeous woman, who I'm going to have lunch and the rest of my life with. ~Jason Barmer, pedestriansaint.com More marriages might survive if the partners realized that sometimes the better comes after the worse. ~Doug Larson One advantage of marriage is that, when you fall out of love with him or he falls out of love with you, it keeps you together until you fall in again. ~Judith Viorst Never get married in the morning, because you never know who you'll meet that night. ~Paul Hornung Divorce: The past tense of marriage. ~Author Unknown Sometimes I wonder if men and women really suit each other. Perhaps they should live next door and just visit now and then. ~Katherine Hepburn A successful marriage requires falling in love many times, always with the same person. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966 In every marriage more than a week old, there are grounds for divorce. The trick is to find, and continue to find, grounds for marriage.

~Robert Anderson, Solitaire & Double Solitaire There is no such cozy combination as man and wife. ~Menander Two things are owed to truthfulness — lasting marriages and short friendships. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com It destroys one's nerves to be amiable every day to the same human being. ~Benjamin Disraeli The sum which two married people owe to one another defies calculation. It is an infinite debt, which can only be discharged through eternity. ~Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Consider the standard two-person married couple, and consider them, for a moment, not as a bastion of heterosexuality or a living witness to Jesus or any other such high-minded abstraction. Rather, consider them in relation to what Karl Marx would have called the "realm of commodities" and George Carlin would call "their stuff." They will possess, at least if they are affluent enough to matter to the economy at all, one VCR, one microwave oven, one electric knife sharpener, one stationary bicycle, and, of course, one house or apartment. Among other things too numerous to mention. The point is, they will share a VCR, a microwave oven, etc.

This is not a matter of ideology or even personal inclination. It is practically the definition of marriage: marriage is socialism among two people. ~Barbara Ehrenreich, "Socialism In One Household," Mother Jones, January 1987 Never go to bed mad. Stay up and fight. ~Phyllis Diller, Phyllis Diller's Housekeeping Hints, 1966 In the opinion of the world, marriage ends all, as it does in a comedy. The truth is precisely the opposite: it begins all. ~Anne Sophie Swetchine In a time when nothing is more certain than change, the commitment of two people to one another has become difficult and rare. Yet, by its scarcity, the beauty and value of this exchange have only been enhanced. ~Robert Sexton An object in possession seldom retains the same charm that it had in pursuit. ~Pliny the Younger, Letters If you made a list of the reasons why any couple got married, and another list of the reasons for their divorce, you'd have a hell of a lot of overlapping.

~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960 A man marries to have a home, but also because he doesn't want to be bothered with sex and all that sort of thing. ~W. Somerset Maugham If two stand shoulder to shoulder against the gods, Happy together, the gods themselves are helpless Against them while they stand so. ~Maxwell Anderson After the chills and fever of love, how nice is the 98.6º of marriage! ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960 There is no substitute for the comfort supplied by the utterly taken-for granted relationship. ~Iris Murdoch English Law prohibits a man from marrying his mother-in-law. This is our idea of useless legislation. ~Author Unknown A wedding anniversary is the celebration of love, trust, partnership, tolerance and tenacity. The order varies for any given year. ~Paul Sweeney Matrimony is a process by which a grocer acquired an account the florist had. ~Francis Rodman Marriage is a book of which the first chapter is written in poetry and the remaining chapters in prose.

~Beverley Nichols Valentine's Day is when a lot of married men are reminded what a poor shot Cupid really is. ~Author Unknown Love is a flower which turns into fruit at marriage. ~Finnish Proverb A dress that zips up the back will bring a husband and wife together. ~James H. Boren All marriages are happy. It's the living together afterward that causes all the trouble. ~Raymond Hull One of the good things that come of a true marriage is, that there is one face on which changes come without your seeing them; or rather there is one face which you can still see the same, through all the shadows which years have gathered upon it. ~George MacDonald As to marriage or celibacy, let a man take which course he will, he will be sure to repent. ~Socrates Love seems the swiftest, but it is the slowest of all growths. No man or woman really knows what perfect love is until they have been married a quarter of a century. ~Mark Twain Never feel remorse for what you have thought about your wife; she has thought much worse things about you.

~Jean Rostand, Le Mariage, 1927 Any intelligent woman who reads the marriage contract, and then goes into it, deserves all the consequences. ~Isadora Duncan When two people are under the influence of the most violent, most insane, most delusive, and most transient of passions, they are required to swear that they will remain in that excited, abnormal, and exhausting condition continuously until death do them part. ~G.B. Shaw, Getting Married, 1908 A first-rate marriage is like a first-rate hotel: expensive, but worth it. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966 Our wedding was many years ago. The celebration continues to this day. ~Gene Perret Matrimony—the high sea for which no compass has yet been invented. ~Heinrich Heine, "Musical Notes from Paris," translated from German by John Snodgrass The reason for much matrimony is patrimony. ~Ogden Nash I figure that the degree of difficulty in combining two lives ranks somewhere between rerouting a hurricane and finding a parking place in downtown Manhattan.

~Claire Cloninger, "When the Glass Slipper Doesn't Fit and the Silver Spoon is in Someone Else's Mouth" A man's wife has more power over him than the state has. ~Ralph Waldo Emerson, Journals Marriage: that I call the will of two to create the one who is more than those who created it. ~Friedrich Nietzsche Three rings of marriage are the engagement ring, the wedding ring, and the suffering. ~Author Unknown Though marriage makes man and wife one flesh, it leaves 'em still two fools. ~William Congreve Marriage ceremony: an incredible metaphysical sham of watching God and the law being dragged into the affairs of your family. ~O.C. Ogilvie A man in love is incomplete until he has married. Then he's finished. ~Zsa Zsa Gabor One should never know too precisely whom one has married. ~Friedrich Nietzsche Bigamy is having one husband too many. Monogamy is the same. ~Author unknown Spouse: someone who'll stand by you through all the trouble you wouldn't have had if you'd stayed single. ~Author Unknown Like good wine, marriage gets better with age — once you learn to keep a cork in it.

~Gene Perret Marriage is a great institution, but I'm not ready for an institution. ~Mae West My wife says I never listen to her. At least I think that's what she said. ~Author Unknown I never knew what real happiness was until I got married. And by then it was too late. ~Max Kauffman Don't smother each other. No one can grow in shade. ~Leo Buscaglia Don't marry the person you think you can live with; marry only the individual you think you can't live without. ~James C. Dobson I have great hopes that we shall love each other all our lives as much as if we had never married at all. ~Lord Byron The chief reason why marriage is rarely a success is that it is contracted while the partners are insane. ~Joseph Collins We have the greatest pre-nuptial agreement in the world. It's called love. ~Gene Perret It takes a loose rein to keep a marriage tight. ~John Stevenson Mistress: something between a mister and a mattress. ~Author Unknown Mother-in-law: a woman who destroys her son-in-law's peace of mind by giving him a piece of hers.

~Author Unknown Bachelor: the only man who has never told his wife a lie. ~Author Unknown Wedding rings: the world's smallest handcuffs. ~Author Unknown How can a woman be expected to be happy with a man who insists on treating her as if she were a perfectly normal human being. ~Oscar Wilde Many a man in love with a dimple makes the mistake of marrying the whole girl. ~Stephen Leacock, Literary Lapses, 1910 The most dangerous food is wedding cake. ~American Proverb Strange to say what delight we married people have to see these poor fools decoyed into our condition. ~Samuel Pepys Home cooking: where many a man thinks his wife is. ~Author Unknown Marriage is not a word — it is a sentence. ~Author Unknown Our marriage has always been a 50-50 proposition — with the possible exception of closet space. ~Gene Perret There is so little difference between husbands you might as well keep the first. ~Adela Rogers St. Johns When a man steals your wife, there is no better revenge than to let him keep her.

~Sacha Guitry, Elles et toi, 1948 It isn't tying himself to one woman that a man dreads when he thinks of marrying; it's separating himself from all the others. ~Helen Rowland, Violets and Vinegar Once a woman has forgiven her man, she must not reheat his sins for breakfast. ~Marlene Dietrich Only choose in marriage a man whom you would choose as a friend if he were a woman. ~Joseph Joubert Never strike your wife — even with a flower. ~Hindu Proverb The difficulty with marriage is that we fall in love with a personality, but must live with a character. ~Peter Devries The big difference between sex for money and sex for free is that sex for money usually costs a lot less. ~Brendan Behan So heavy is the chain of wedlock that it needs two to carry it, and sometimes three. ~Alexandre Dumas, fils Marriage is three parts love and seven parts forgiveness of sins. ~Langdon Mitchell Bride, n. A woman with a fine prospect behind her.

~Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary, 1911 What counts in making a happy marriage is not so much how compatible you are, but how you deal with incompatibility. ~George Levinger Love-matches are made by people who are content, for a month of honey, to condemn themselves to a life of vinegar. ~Countess of Blessington Almost no one is foolish enough to imagine that he automatically deserves great success in any field of activity; yet almost everyone believes that he automatically deserves success in marriage. ~Sydney J. Harris That quiet mutual gaze of a trusting husband and wife is like the first moment of rest or refuge from a great weariness or a great danger. ~George Eliot The husband who doesn't tell his wife everything probably reasons that what she doesn't know won't hurt him. ~Leo J. Burke You can never be happily married to another until you get a divorce from yourself. Successful marriage demands a certain death to self. ~Jerry McCant Married life teaches one invaluable lesson: to think of things far enough ahead not to say them.

~Jefferson Machamer It's easy to understand love at first sight, but how do we explain love after two people have been looking at each other for years? ~Author Unknown Just as Amy and Jay had for decades slept nude together, inhaling each other's odors, her hands familiar with the man's body hair. Even her face creams and his night grunts would have entered into it. And shared cakes of soap and clothes closets and dinners — such a complex of intimacies. ~Saul Bellow (1915–2005), The Actual, 1997 The majority of husbands remind me of an orangutan trying to play the violin. ~Honoré de Balzac, The Physiology of Marriage You have to treat your wife like you treated her when you first met her and were trying to get her in bed. ~Alice Cooper, interview with Cal Fussman, 2008 August 2nd, for Esquire's January 2009 eighth annual Meaning of Life issue Never marry for money. Ye'll borrow it cheaper.

~Scottish Proverb Do you know what it means to come home at night to a woman who'll give you a little love, a little affection, a little tenderness? It means you're in the wrong house, that's what it means. ~Henny Youngman It's a nasty divorce when they can't agree on how to divvy up the His and Hers towels. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com The problem with marriage is that it ends every night after making love, and it must be rebuilt every morning before breakfast. ~Gabriel García Márquez She cried, and the judge wiped her tears with my checkbook. ~Tommy Manville By all means marry; if you get a good wife, you'll be happy; if you get a bad one, you'll become a philosopher. ~Socrates A happy marriage is the union of two good forgivers. ~Ruth Bell Graham Pity all newlyweds. She cooks something nice for him, and he brings her flowers, and they kiss and think: How easy marriage is. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960 One man's folly is another man's wife.

~Helen Rowland Women hope men will change after marriage but they don't; men hope women won't change but they do. ~Bettina Arndt, Private Lives, 1986 Marriage halves our griefs, doubles our joys, and quadruples our expenses. ~English Proverb It was Mrs. Campbell, for instance, who, on a celebrated occasion, threw her companion into a flurry by describing her recent marriage as "the deep, deep peace of the double-bed after the hurly-burly of the chaise-longue." ~Alexander Woollcott, While Rome Burns Before marriage, a girl has to make love to a man to hold him. After marriage, she has to hold him to make love to him. ~Marilyn Monroe A perfect marriage is one in which "I'm sorry" is said just often enough. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960 Marriage must constantly fight against a monster which devours everything: routine. ~Honoré de Balzac Bachelors know more about women than married men; if they didn't they'd be married too. ~H.L.

Mencken In marriage there are no manners to keep up, and beneath the wildest accusations no real criticism. Each is familiar with that ancient child in the other who may erupt again.... We are not ridiculous to ourselves. We are ageless. That is the luxury of the wedding ring. ~Enid Bagnold, Autobiography, 1969 Many marriages are simply working partnerships between businessmen and housekeepers. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960 The highest happiness on earth is marriage. ~William Lyon Phelps It is not for the fresh cheek, the full lip, the fair forehead, the parted sweeps of sunny hair, and the girlish charm of form and features, that we love the wives who have walked hand in hand with us for years, but for new graces, opening each morning like flowers in the parterre, their predecessors having accomplished their beautiful mission and gone to seed. Old love renewed again, through new motives to love, is certainly a thing lovely in itself, and desirable by all whose ambition and happiness it is to sit supreme in a single heart...

~Timothy Titcomb (Josiah Gilbert Holland), Gold-foil: Hammered from Popular Proverbs Marriage is more than four bare legs in a bed. ~Hoshang N. Akhtar A fellow ought to save a few of the long evenings he spends with his girl till after they're married. ~Kin Hubbard Two mothers-in-law. ~Lord John Russell, on being asked what he would consider a proper punishment for bigamy Though women are angels, yet wedlock's the devil. ~Lord Byron, Hours of Idleness A psychiatrist asks a lot of expensive questions your wife asks for nothing. ~Joey Adams A question asked in a Surrey school exam went: "Why do cocks crow early every morning?" A twelve-year-old replied: "My dad says they have to make the most of it while the hens are asleep." ~Quoted in the Peterborough Daily Telegraph, 1983 A man may be a fool and not know it, but not if he is married. ~H.L. Mencken Marriage is a meal where the soup is better than the dessert. ~Austin O'Malley Marriage is a feast where the grace is sometimes better than the dinner.

~Charles Caleb Colton One shouldn't be too inquisitive in life Either about God's secrets or one's wife. ~Geoffrey Chaucer, The Canterbury Tales, translated by Nevill Coghill, 1950s Most wives think of their husbands as bumbling braggarts with whom they happen to be in love. ~Jackie Gleason For two people in a marriage to live together day after day is unquestionably the one miracle the Vatican has overlooked. ~Bill Cosby, Love and Marriage I have learned that only two things are necessary to keep one's wife happy. First, let her think she's having her own way. And second, let her have it. ~Lyndon B. Johnson Marriage is a ghastly public confession of a strictly private intention. ~Ian Hay Some marriages break up, and some do not, and in our world you can usually explain the former better than the latter. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966 My mother said it was simple to keep a man, you must be a maid in the living room, a cook in the kitchen and a whore in the bedroom.

I said I'd hire the other two and take care of the bedroom bit. ~Jerry Hall The marriage state, with or without the affection suitable to it, is the completest image of Heaven and Hell we are capable of receiving in this life. ~Richard Steele, The Spectator Adultery is the application of democracy to love. ~Henry Louis Mencken, "Sententiae," A Book of Burlesques, 1920 A dog is much like a married man, obeying his master's voice for the sake of his master's touch. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com A happy marriage is a long conversation which always seems too short. ~Andre Maurois Marriage: A legal or religious ceremony by which two persons of the opposite sex solemnly agree to harass and spy on each other for ninety-nine years, or until death do them join. ~Elbert Hubbard In the early years, you fight because you don't understand each other. In the later years, you fight because you do. ~Joan Didion It is easy to mistake being ready for a wedding with being ready for marriage. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com Marriage isn't all that it's cracked up to be.

Let me tell you, honestly. Marriage is probably the chief cause of divorce. ~Larry Gelbart, M*A*S*H, "Bulletin Board," original airdate 14 January 1975, spoken by the character Frank Burns When a girl marries she exchanges the attentions of many men for the inattention of one. ~Helen Rowland In the long run wives are to be paid in a peculiar coin — consideration for their feelings. As it usually turns out this is an enormous, unthinkable inflation few men will remit, or if they will, only with a sense of being overcharged. ~Elizabeth Hardwick, Seduction and Betrayal, 1974 Before marriage, a man declares that he would lay down his life to serve you; after marriage, he won't even lay down his newspaper to talk to you. ~Helen Rowland Being divorced is like being hit by a Mack truck. If you live through it, you start looking very carefully to the right and to the left. ~Jean Kerr, Mary, Mary, 1960 Marriage changes passion — suddenly you're in bed with a relative. ~Author Unknown It is not marriage that fails; it is people that fail.

All that marriage does is to show people up. ~Harry Emerson Fosdick A wedding is just like a funeral except that you get to smell your own flowers. ~Grace Hansen The view that a peptic ulcer may be the hole in a man's stomach through which he crawls to escape from his wife has fairly wide acceptance. ~John Allan Dalrymple Anderson I've been married to one Marxist and one Fascist, and neither one would take the garbage out. ~Lee Grant Often the difference between a successful marriage and a mediocre one consists of leaving about three or four things a day unsaid. ~Harlan Miller The man who never in his life Has washed the dishes with his wife Or polished up the silver plate - He still is largely celibate. ~Christopher Morley, Washing the Dishes Marry someone who looks sexy while disappointed. ~"Phil's-osophy" by Phil Dunphy (Christopher Lloyd, Steven Levitan, and Dan O'Shannon, Modern Family, "Schooled," original airdate 2012 Oct 10) A love that lasts for twenty years may be better than love, but it isn't love.

~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966 God created sex. Priests created marriage. ~Voltaire To avoid mistakes and regrets, always consult your wife before engaging in a flirtation. ~E.W. Howe The secret of a happy marriage remains a secret. ~Henny Youngman Marriage is a mistake every man should make. ~George Jessel I guess walking slow getting married is because it gives you time to maybe change your mind. ~Virginia Cary Hudson A husband is what is left of the lover after the nerve has been extracted. ~Helen Rowland My husband and I divorced over religious differences. He thought he was God, and I didn't. ~Author Unknown Marriage is the alliance of two people, one of whom never remembers birthdays and the other never forgets them. ~Ogden Nash One thing you learn in a long marriage is how many sneezes to wait before saying, "Bless you." ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com Husbands are like fires. They go out when unattended.

~Zsa Zsa Gabor The concern that some women show at the absence of their husbands, does not arise from their not seeing them and being with them, but from their apprehension that their husbands are enjoying pleasures in which they do not participate, and which, from their being at a distance, they have not the power of interrupting. ~Michel de Montaigne But married once, a man is stak'd or pown'd, and cannot graze beyond his own hedge. ~Philip Massinger, Fatal Dowry, 1632 Marriage is the only war in which you sleep with the enemy. ~François VI de la Rochefoucault Why do married men gain weight while bachelors don't? Bachelors go to the refrigerator, see nothing they want, then go to bed. Married guys go to the bed, see nothing they want, then go to the refrigerator. ~Author Unknown I never married because there was no need. I have three pets at home which answer the same purpose as a husband. I have a dog which growls every morning, a parrot which swears all afternoon, and a cat that comes home late at night.

~Marie Corelli Women seem to be all right on bargains till it comes to picking out a husband. ~Kin Hubbard After a few years of marriage, a man can look right at a woman without seeing her — and a woman can see right through a man without looking at him. ~Helen Rowland Why get married? For human beings, marriage is such an unnatural state. If you want monogamy, it has been said, you should marry a swan. ~Quentin Crisp, "The Art of Celibacy" Wives are young men's mistresses; companions for middle age; and old men's nurses. ~Francis Bacon, "Of Marriage and Single Life," Essays or Counsels, Civil and Moral, 1625 Marriage: A word which should be pronounced "mirage." ~Herbert Spencer A man without a wife is like a vase without flowers. ~African Proverb Like my vodka, my marriage is on the rocks. ~Craig D. Slovak A woman ought to look up to her husband, if only a half-inch. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960 A woman who loves her husband is merely paying her bills.

A woman who loves her lover gives alms to the poor. ~Paul-Jean Toulet Love requires a willingness to die; marriage, a willingness to live. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966 Give up all hope of peace so long as your mother-in-law is alive. ~Juvenal, Satires We were happily married for eight months. Unfortunately, we were married for four and a half years. ~Nick Faldo Men never know how tired they are till their wives sit them down for a nice long talk. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960 The reason they're called the opposite sex is because every time you think you have your wife fooled — it's just the opposite! ~Walter Winchell By the time you're his Shivering and sighing, And he vows his passion is Infinite, undying Lady, make a note of this: One of you is lying. ~Dorothy Parker Originally marriage meant the sale of a woman by one man to another; now most women sell themselves though they have no intention of delivering the goods listed in the bill of sale.

~Robert Graves If I ever marry, it will be on a sudden impulse — as a man shoots himself. ~H.L. Mencken [M]en are April when they woo, December when they wed: maids are May when they are maids, but the sky changes when they are wives. ~William Shakespeare, As You Like It [IV, 1, Rosalind] My wife tells me she doesn't care what I do when I'm away, as long as I'm not enjoying it. ~Lee Trevino To keep your marriage brimming, With love in the loving cup, Whenever you're wrong, admit it; Whenever you're right, shut up. ~Ogden Nash "What's for dinner?" is the only question many husbands ask their wives, and the only one to which they care about the answer. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966 Most marriages can survive "better or worse." The tester is all the years of "exactly the same." ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com Hubert Humphrey talks so fast that listening to him is like trying to read Playboy magazine with your wife turning the pages.

~Barry Goldwater People do not marry people, not real ones anyway; they marry what they think the person is; they marry illusions and images. The exciting adventure of marriage is finding out who the partner really is. ~James L. Framo, "Explorations in Marital & Family Therapy" Men have a much better time of it than women. For one thing, they marry later; for another thing, they die earlier. ~H.L. Mencken I dreamed of a wedding of elaborate elegance, A church filled with family and friends. I asked him what kind of a wedding he wished for, He said one that would make me his wife. ~Author Unknown No man expects a great deal from marriage. He is quite satisfied if his wife is a good cook, a good valet, an attentive audience, and a patient nurse. ~Author Unknown Think not because you are now wed That all your courtship's at an end. ~Antonio Hurtado de Mendoza Alimony is like buying oats for a dead horse. ~Arthur Baer I came from a big family. As a matter of fact, I never got to sleep alone until I was married.

~Lewis Grizzard There is no more lovely, friendly and charming relationship, communion or company than a good marriage. ~Martin Luther Alimony — The ransom that the happy pay to the devil. ~H.L. Mencken, "Sententiae," A Book of Burlesques, 1920 If marriage were outlawed, only outlaws would have in-laws. ~Author Unknown As a general guideline, never marry anyone that you can't picture helping you go to the bathroom. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com Getting divorced just because you don't love a man is almost as silly as getting married just because you do. ~Zsa Zsa Gabor I've sometimes thought of marrying, and then I've thought again. ~Noel Coward, 1956 Thus Dante's motto over Inferno applies with equal force to marriage: "Ye who enter here leave all hope behind." ~Emma Goldman, Marriage and Love Wasn't marriage, like life, unstimulating and unprofitable and somewhat empty when too well ordered and protected and guarded.

Wasn't it finer, more splendid, more nourishing, when it was, like life itself, a mixture of the sordid and the magnificent; of mud and stars; of earth and flowers; of love and hate and laughter and tears and ugliness and beauty and hurt. ~Edna Ferber, Show Boat, 1926 "I am" is reportedly the shortest sentence in the English language. Could it be that "I do" is the longest sentence? ~Author Unknown Affairs are just as disillusioning as marriage, and much less restful. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Second Neurotic's Notebook, 1966 Marriage is a lottery in which men stake their liberty and women their happiness. ~Virginie des Rieux, Epigrams Wedlock is a padlock. ~John Ray, English Proverbs ...setting aside popular twaddle on the eternal sanctity of the marriage-tie and all that... ~John Hill, The Waters of Marah, 1883 The marriage of convenience has this to recommend it: we are better judges of convenience than we are of love.

~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960 Love is blind, but marriage restores its sight. ~Samuel Lichtenberg The best way to remember your wife's birthday is to forget it once. ~H.V. Prochnow Marriage is like pleading guilty to an indefinite sentence. Without parole. ~John Mortimer, The Trials of Rumpole One of the best things about marriage is that it gets young people to bed at a decent hour. ~M.M. Musselman Marriage is like a bank account. You put it in, you take it out, you lose interest. ~Irwin Corey If you want to sacrifice the admiration of many men for the criticism of one, go ahead, get married. ~Katharine Houghton Hepburn The total amount of undesired sex endured by women is probably greater in marriage than in prostitution.

~Bertrand Russell, Marriage and Morals Love, the strongest and deepest element in all life, the harbinger of hope, of joy, of ecstasy; love, the defier of laws, of all conventions; love, the freest, the most powerful molder of human destiny; how can such an all-compelling force be synonymous with that poor little State- and church-begotten weed, marriage? ~Emma Goldman, Marriage and Love What we love about love is the fever, which marriage puts to bed and cures. ~Mignon McLaughlin, The Neurotic's Notebook, 1960 Between a man and his wife nothing ought to rule but love. ~William Penn On rare occasions one does hear of a miraculous case of a married couple falling in love after marriage, but on close examination it will be found that it is a mere adjustment to the inevitable. ~Emma Goldman, Marriage and Love Marriage is a wonderful invention: then again, so is a bicycle repair kit. ~Billy Connolly Marriage is nature's way of ensuring that a woman picks up some mothering experience before she has her first child. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com Marriage is good for those who are afraid to sleep alone at night.

~St. Jerome, Attack on Jovinian [M]y mother once told me that if a married couple puts a penny in a pot for every time they make love in the first year, and takes a penny out every time after that, they'll never get all the pennies out of the pot. ~Armistead Maupin, Tales of the City, 1978 The way to hold a husband is to keep him a little jealous; the way to lose him is to keep him a little more jealous. ~H.L. Mencken A great poet has seldom sung of lawfully wedded happiness, but of free and secret love; and in this respect, too the time is coming when there will no longer be one standard of morality for poetry and another for life. To anyone tender of conscience, the ties formed by a free connection are stronger than the legal ones. ~Ellen Key, quoted by Sprading in Liberty and the Great Libertarians Any married man should forget his mistakes — no use two people remembering the same thing. ~Duane Dewel Men who have a pierced ear are better prepared for marriage — they've experienced pain and bought jewelry.

~Rita Rudner He was doubtless an understanding Fellow that said, there was no happy Marriage but betwixt a blind Wife and a deaf Husband. ~Michel de Montaigne, "Upon Some Verses of Virgil" Come, let's be a comfortable couple and take care of each other! How glad we shall be, that we have somebody we are fond of always, to talk to and sit with. ~Charles Dickens Getting married is a lot like getting into a tub of hot water. After you get used to it, it ain't so hot. ~Minnie Pearl People make mistakes, — that's why God invented divorce. ~Mistresses, "Lean In" [S4, E5, 2016], written by Rina Mimoun Love is grand; divorce a hundred grand. ~Author unknown It is easier to be a lover than a husband for the simple reason that it is more difficult to be witty every day than to say pretty things from time to time. ~Balzac, Physiologie du mariage, 1829 A single man has not nearly the value he would have in a state of union. He is an incomplete animal.

He resembles the odd half of a pair of scissors. ~Benjamin Franklin And when will there be an end of marrying? I suppose, when there is an end of living! ~Tertullian The surest way to be alone is to get married. ~Gloria Steinem [W]hen you realize you want to spend the rest of your life with somebody, you want the rest of your life to start as soon as possible. ~Nora Ephron, When Harry Met Sally It's a funny thing that when a man hasn't anything on earth to worry about, he goes off and gets married. ~Robert Frost I never even believed in divorce until after I got married. ~Diane Ford As a man, I've learned that there is nothing easier in married life than pleasing your wife with your cooking. ~Robert Brault, rbrault.blogspot.com Someone once asked me why women don't gamble as much as men do, and I gave the common-sensical reply that we don't have as much money. That was a true but incomplete answer. In fact, women's total instinct for gambling is satisfied by marriage. ~Gloria Steinem Courtship to marriage is as a very witty prologue to a very dull play.

~William Congreve, The Old Bachelor, 1693 If you want to read about love and marriage, you've got to buy two separate books. ~Alan King They dream in courtship, but in wedlock wake. ~Alexander Pope, The Wife of Bath, 1713 Marriage is like a phone call in the night: first the ring, and then you wake up. ~Evelyn Hendrickson When the one man loves the one woman and the one woman loves the one man, the very angels desert heaven and come and sit in that house and sing for joy. ~The Brahma Sutras Love is one long sweet dream, and marriage is the alarm clock. ~Author Unknown If you are afraid of loneliness, don't marry. ~Anton Chekhov The music at a marriage procession always reminds me of the music of soldiers entering on a battle. ~Heinrich Heine, "Thoughts and Fancies," translated from German by John Snodgrass The trouble with some women is that they get all excited about nothing — and then marry him. ~Cher If you haven't seen your wife smile at a traffic cop, you haven't seen her smile her prettiest.

~Kin Hubbard Is not marriage an open question, when it is alleged, from the beginning of the world, that such as are in the institution wish to get out, and such as are out wish to get in? ~Ralph Waldo Emerson, Representative Men, 1850 When a man opens the car door for his wife, it's either a new car or a new wife. ~Prince Philip You should never kiss a girl unless you have enough bucks to buy her a big ring and her own VCR, 'cause she'll want to have videos of the wedding. ~Attributed to a 10-year-old named Jim It gives me a headache to think about that stuff. I'm just a kid. I don't need that kind of trouble. ~Attributed to a 7-year-old named Kenny, when asked if it's better to be single or married Marriage is a bribe to make the housekeeper think she's a householder. ~Thornton Wilder No married man is genuinely happy if he has to drink worse whisky than he used to drink when he was single. ~H.L. Mencken Marriage, a market which has nothing free but the entrance.

~Michel de Montaigne I'd marry again if I found a man who had fifteen million dollars and would sign over half of it to me before the marriage, and guarantee he'd be dead within the year. ~Bette Davis Men should keep their eyes wide open before marriage, and half-shut afterwards. ~Madeleine de Scudery Marrying for love may be a bit risky, but it is so honest that God can't help but smile on it. ~Josh Billings Politics doesn't make strange bedfellows — marriage does. ~Groucho Marx Why does a woman work ten years to change a man's habits and then complain that he's not the man she married? ~Barbra Streisand No man is regular in his attendance at the House of Commons until he is married. ~Benjamin Disraeli In olden times sacrifices were made at the altar, a custom which is still continued. ~Helen Rowland, Reflections of a Bachelor Girl, 1909 He's the kind of man a woman would have to marry to get rid of. ~Mae West The concept of two people living together for 25 years without a serious dispute suggests a lack of spirit only to be admired in sheep.

~A.P. Herbert Never get married in college; it's hard to get a start if a prospective employer finds you've already made one mistake. ~Elbert Hubbard Marriage means commitment. Of course, so does insanity. ~Author unknown Love: A temporary insanity curable by marriage. ~Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary The Delights of Wisdom concerning Conjugial Love: After Which Follow the Pleasures of Insanity... ~Emanuel Swedenborg, title of 1768 book, translated from the Latin [Just a little truncated silliness. Please note this is not used as intended, and I chopped off the end of the title ("concerning scortatory love"). And 'conjugial' means marriage. —tεᖇᖇ¡·g] Quotes by Comedian and Actress Mae West By Jone Johnson Lewis Updated August 14, 2016. Mae West was best known as a comedian and actress whose bawdy plays and movies were full of double entendres and attracted the attention of industry censors. Less well known is her role as writer in many productions.

Her film career -- mainly at Paramount in the 1930s -- seemed to stop in 1943, but she returned in the 1970s for Myra Breckinridge, a cult classic, and Sextette. Selected Mae West Quotations • I believe in censorship. I made a fortune out of it. • If I asked for a cup of coffee, someone would search for the double meaning. • I wrote the story myself. It's all about a girl who lost her reputation but never missed it. • When I'm good, I'm very good. When I'm bad, I'm better. • Too much of a good thing can be wonderful. • It's hard to be funny when you have to be clean. • I'm a woman of very few words, but lots of action. • I generally avoid temptation unless I can't resist it. • It isn't what I do, but how I do it. It isn't what I say, but how I say it, and how I look when I do it and say it.

continue reading below our video What are the Seven Wonders of the World • I'll try anything once, twice if I like it, three times to make sure. • When choosing between two evils, I always like to try the one I've never tried before. • Marriage is a great institution, but I'm not ready for an institution yet. • I used to be Snow White, but I drifted. • Why don't you come on up and see me sometime -- when I've got nothin' on but the radio. • Why don't you come up sometime and see me? I'm home every evening. Come up. I'll tell your fortune. Ah, you can be had. • Life's just a merry-go-round. Come on up. You might get a brass ring. • She's the kind of girl who climbed the ladder of success wrong by wrong. • When women go wrong, men go right after them. • There are no good girls gone wrong, just bad girls found out. • Is that a gun in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me? • Is that a banana in your pocket, or are you just happy to see me? • It is better to be looked over than overlooked.

• Keep a diary, and someday it'll keep you. • To err is human, but it feels divine. • Love conquers all things except poverty and toothache. • I've been rich and I've been poor. Believe me, rich is better. • Sex is emotion in motion. • Virtue has its own reward, but no sale at the box office. • Those who are easily shocked should be shocked more often. • I like my clothes to be tight enough to show I'm a woman, but loose enough to show I'm a lady. • You're never too old to become younger. • I like restraint, if it doesn't go too far. • I'm the lady who works at Paramount all day... and Fox all night. • I never worry about diets. The only carrots that interest me are the number you get in a diamond. • A dame that knows the ropes isn't likely to get tied up. • Love thy neighbor -- and if he happens to be tall, debonair and devastating, it will be that much easier. • It's all right for a perfect stranger to kiss your hand as long as he's perfect.

• It's not the men in my life that count, it's the life in my men. • Every man I meet wants to protect me. I can't figure out what from. • A man in the house is worth two in the street. • A girl in the convertible is worth five in the phone book. • A hard man is good to find. • Ten men waiting for me at the door? Send one of them home, I'm tired. • Give a man a free hand and he'll run it all over you. • A man can be short and dumpy and getting bald but if he has fire, women will like him. • An ounce of performance is worth pounds of promises. • Don't keep a man guessing too long -- he's sure to find the answer somewhere else. • Look your best -- who said love is blind? • Flattery will get you everywhere. • I've been things and seen places. • I'm no angel, but I've spread my wings a bit. • The score never interested me, only the game. • Men are my hobby. If I ever got married I'd have to give it up. • So many men... so little time.

• I only like two kinds of men, domestic and imported. • Personally, I like two types of men - domestic and foreign. • I go for two kinds of men. The kind with muscles, and the kind without. • I only have 'yes' men around me. Who needs 'no' men? • Save a boyfriend for a rainy day -- and another, in case it doesn't rain. • Some men are all right in their place -- if they only knew the right places! • I like a man who's good, but not too good -- for the good die young, and I hate a dead one. • I feel like a million tonight. But one at a time. • Men are easy to get but hard to keep. • Men? Sure, I've known lots of them. But I never found one I liked well enough to marry. Besides, I've always been busy with my work. Marriage is a career in itself and to make a success of it you've got to keep working at it. So until I can give the proper amount of time to marriage, I'll stay single. • His mother should have thrown him out and kept the stork.

• He's the kind of man a woman would have to marry to get rid of. • Don't marry a man to reform him -- that's what reform schools are for. • Opportunity knocks for every man, but you have to give a woman a ring. • It takes two to get one in trouble. • Too many girls follow the line of least resistance -- but a good line is hard to resist. • Good women are no fun. The only good woman I can recall in history was Betsy Ross . And all she ever made was a flag. • Good sex is like good Bridge. If you don't have a good partner, you'd better have a good hand. • Diamonds is my career. • When it comes to finances, remember that there are no withholding taxes on the wages of sin. • No gold-digging for me. I take diamonds! We may be off the gold standard someday. • You can do what you want, but saving love doesn't bring any interest. • Any time you got nothing to do and lots of time to do it, come on up. • Anything worth doing is worth doing slowly. • Kiss and make up -- but too much makeup has ruined many a kiss.

• Brains are an asset to the woman in love who's smart enough to hide 'em. • Some women pick men to marry -- and others pick them to pieces. • Say what you want about long dresses, but they cover a multitude of shins. • Let men see what's coming to them, and women will get what's coming to them. • Cultivate your curves -- they may be dangerous but they won't be avoided. • I didn't discover curves; I only uncovered them. • The curve is more powerful than the sword. • I've been in more laps than a napkin. • I'd like to see Paris before I die. Philadelphia will do. • I see you're a man with ideals. I better be going before you've still got them. • Women with "pasts" interest men because men hope that history will repeat itself. • Don't ever make the same mistake twice, unless it pays. • Right now I think censorship is necessary; the things they're doing and saying in films right now just shouldn't be allowed. There's no dignity anymore and I think that's very important. • The best way to behave is to misbehave.

• You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough. More Women's Quotes A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W XYZ About These Quotes Quote collection assembled by Jone Johnson Lewis . Each quotation page in this collection and the entire collection © Jone Johnson Lewis. This is an informal collection assembled over many years. I regret that I am not be able to provide the original source if it is not listed with the quote. Mae West Quotes Page 3 - BrainyQuote Find on Amazon: Mae West Cite this Page: Citation Mae West - Biography - IMDb Biography Showing all 112 items Jump to: Overview (5) | Mini Bio (2) | Spouse (1) | Trade Mark (5) | Trivia (48) | Personal Quotes (46) | Salary (5) Overview (5) 5' (1.52 m) Mini Bio (2) Mae West was born in Queens, New York, to "Battling Jack" West and Matilda Doelger.

She began her career as a child star in vaudeville, and later went on to write her own plays, including "SEX", for which she was arrested. Though her first movie role was a small part in Night After Night (1932), her scene has become famous. A coat check girl exclaims, "Goodness! What lovely diamonds!", after seeing Mae's jewelry. Mae replies, "Goodness had nothing to do with it". Her next film, in which she starred, came the following year. She Done Him Wrong (1933) was based on her earlier and very popular play, "Diamond Lil". She went on to write and star in seven more films, including My Little Chickadee (1940) with W.C. Fields . Her last movie was Sextette (1978), which also came from a play. She died two years later. Rampant double entendres. Trivia (48) Hollywood's outrageous, self-proclaimed psychic Criswell predicted in 1955 that she would win the 1960 Presidential election, and would fly to the moon in 1965 with him and friend Liberace !.

After two years of denying that she had ever been married, West admitted in a reply to a legal interrogatory in 1937 that she and Frank Wallace had married in 1911. During her divorce trial in 1942, she testified that they had lived together only "several weeks". According to actor Tony Curtis , her famous walk originated while beginning her career as a stage actress. Special six-inch platforms were attached to her shoes to increase the height of her stage presence. Her walk literally was "one foot at a time." During World War II, United States Navy and Army pilots and crewmen in the Pacific named their inflatable life vests after her, supposedly because of her well-endowed attributes. The term "Mae West" for a lifejacket continues to this day. She was with George Raft in both her first ( Night After Night (1932)) and last ( Sextette (1978)) film. Appears on sleeve of The Beatles "Sgt Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band". West at first declined to be pictured on the cover ("What would I be doing in a lonely hearts club?!"), but reconsidered when the Beatles sent her a handwritten personal request.

Former Beatle Ringo Starr appeared with West in Sextette (1978). He was unpleasantly surprised at first, at all the attention given her on the set (usually reserved for pop stars like The Beatles ), but came to admire West during the shoot, and praised her afterwards. Is sometimes credited with originating the Shimmy (a once-popular dance). Was banned from NBC Radio after a guest appearance in 1937 with Edgar Bergen and Charlie McCarthy that was loaded with flirtatious dialogue and double-entendres. She returned to the network as a guest on the "Perry Como Show" in 1949. She was famous for her morning enemas, which she claimed made her skin like silk and left her "smelling sweet at both ends". On the set of her last film Sextette (1978), co-star Tony Curtis claimed that she was given an enema after being made up, at approximately 11:00 in the morning, as the last step of her preparations before going before the camera. According to psychic Kenny Kingston , she wrote all her plays while in a trance.

Her films are credited with single-handedly saving failing and debt-ridden Paramount Pictures from bankruptcy in the early 1930s. Was named #15 Actress on The American Film Institutes 50 Greatest Screen Legends At one point, her chauffeur was Jerry Orbach (who is best known for playing Detective Lennie Briscoe on all four "Law & Order" television series). Is portrayed by Ann Jillian in Mae West (1982) and by Gloria Gray in Marlene (2000) One of the first women to consistently write the movies she starred in. Playing opposite Ed Wynn in Arthur Hammerstein 's "Sometime," with music by Rudolf Friml , she introduced the shimmy to the Broadway stage in 1918. The dance requires hardly any movement of the feet but continuous movement of the shoulders, torso and pelvis. She had seen the dance at black cafés in Chicago. Once when she was scheduled to play a theater in New Haven, Conneticut, the theater's management refused to let her go on because her act was too "risqué" and canceled the show. Disappointed, Yale University students rioted and wrecked the theater.

Eldest of three children of John Patrick West, an occasional prizefighter and livery-stable owner, and Matilda Delker Doelger, a one-time corset and fashion model. A baby girl died before Mae was born the after Mae there was another girl and a boy. During World War II, Miss West's name was applied to various pieces of military equipment and was thus listed in Webster's New International Dictionary, Second Edition. The Royal Air Force named its inflatable lifejackets "Mae Wests", and United States Army soldiers referred to twin-turreted combat tanks also as "Mae Wests". Was not a smoker or a drinker. Died apparently of natural causes in the wake of a mild stroke she suffered three months prior that left her speech impaired. Also suffered from diabetes the last 15 years of her life. She was born Mary Jane West in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn. Mae's father, John Patrick "Jack" West, was a featherweight prizefighter called "Battling Jack" West, and later a stable master; he was of English and Irish descent (his own mother was an Irish immigrant). Mae's mother, Matilda Decker Doelger, was an immigrant from Germany.

Turned down a role in Elvis Presley 's film Roustabout (1964), which eventually went to Barbara Stanwyck . Was at one point Hollywood's highest paid star. Surrealist artist Salvador Dalí created one of his most iconic works influenced by her: "Mae West's Lips Sofa" (1937). The Coca-Cola bottle was said to have been designed with Mae West's figure as inspiration. There is a photo in fundamentalist preacher Billy Sunday's autobiography (circa 1932) of Billy Sunday and Mae West pouring out a bottle of beer into the river. Was in consideration for the part of Norma Desmond in Sunset Boulevard (1950) but Gloria Swanson , who went on to receive a Best Actress Oscar nomination for her performance, was cast instead. Has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1560 Vine Street in Hollywood, California. Although critics thought that she and W.C. Fields worked well together on camera, West reputedly did not admire him. In April 1927, West was convicted of "producing an immoral play", the title of which was Sex.

She was sentenced to ten days in jail in New York City, but was given one day off for good behavior. Critic George Jean Nathan once called her "The Statue of Libido". When W.C. Fields called her "My little broodmare", she almost hit him. Guido Deiro claims that West married his father, Guido Deiro , in 1914 under an assumed name, Catherine Mae Belle West, and on the condition of secrecy. West left Deiro in 1916, and "divorced" him on 9 November 1920. Singer Miss Beverly Arden , sister of Mae West. The comedy entitled "Sex" she wrote in 1926 revived in NY, off Broadway, Dec. 1999. Graduated from Brooklyn's Erasmus Hall High School in 1911, as did silent film star Norma Talmadge. She had a double thyroid. Her doctor wanted her to have one of her thyroids surgically removed, but she refused as the double thyroid was not affecting her health in the slightest.

A "Mae West" is a slang term for type of parachute malfunction called a "lineover" in which the suspension lines divide the main canopy into two sections, lending the appearance of a huge brassiere. Made her Broadway debut on September 22, 1911, at the New York Folies Bergère, co-owned by Jesse L. Lasky . Twenty-one years later, West signed with Paramount Pictures, which was co-founded by Lasky. Had a chimpanzee she named Coffee that she gave to her friend Ralph Helfer , renowned animal trainer and Hollywood animal behaviorist who owned the "Africa U.S.A." Exotic Animal Ranch in Soledad Canyon, California. Her frank, sexual innuendo-laced play "Sex" opened at Daly's 63rd Street Theatre on April 26, 1926. Ironically, that theatre had been built twelve years earlier by two Christian societies - the People's Pulpit and the International Bible Student's Association - that had intended it to be used for the presentation of biblical films and lectures. Lent her name to life preservers, art, graphs, album covers, statues, table radios, songs, etc.

Is mentioned in Cole Porter's song "Anything Goes" from a musical of the same name. Her father built a stage for her in the basement of their house in Brooklyn. Her mother had wanted to be an actress. Personal Quotes (46) It's better to be looked over than overlooked. A hard man is good to find. Men are my life, diamonds are my career! When women go wrong, men go right after them! When caught between two evils I generally pick the one I've never tried before. When I'm good, I'm very good. But when I'm bad, I'm better. Marriage is a great institution. I'm not ready for an institution. It's not the man in your life that counts. It's the life in your man. Is that a gun in your pocket or are you just glad to see me? I believe in censorship. After all, I made a fortune out of it. I only like two kinds of men: Foreign and Domestic. Too much of a good thing is wonderful. I'm no model lady. A model's just an imitation of the real thing. Don't marry a man to reform him. That's what reform schools are for.

It's hard to be funny when you have to be clean. I wrote the story myself. It's all about a girl who lost her reputation but never missed it. It ain't sin if you crack a few laws now and then, just so long as you don't break any. Personality is the glitter that sends your little gleam across the footlights and the orchestra pit into that big black space where the audience is. Good girls go to heaven. Bad girls go everywhere else. I used to be Snow White, but I drifted. Ten men waiting for me at the door? Send one of them home, I'm tired. On desire: Sex is an emotion in motion....love is what you make it and who you make it with. I do all my writing in bed; everybody knows I do my best work there. To err is human, but it feels divine. Few men know how to kiss well. Fortunately, I've always had time to teach them. I always save one boyfriend for a rainy day . . . and another in case it doesn't rain. Why don't you come up sometime and see me? I'm home every evening . . . Come up, and I'll tell your fortune.

I freely chose the kind of life I led because I was convinced that a woman has as much right as a man to live the way she does if she does no actual harm to society. The man I don't like doesn't exist. I generally avoid temptation unless I can't resist it. It isn't what I do, but how I do it. It isn't what I say, but how I say it, and how I look when I do it and say it. I'm not good and tired, just tired. Men are easy to get but hard to keep. [on style] It's all right for a perfect stranger to kiss your hand as long as he's perfect. [on love] A man's kiss is his signature. [on growth] He who hesitates is a damn fool. A dame that knows the ropes isn't likely to get tied up. [on Marilyn Monroe ] The only gal who came near to me in the sex appeal department was pretty little Marilyn Monroe . All the others had were big boobs. My advice for those gals who think they have to take their clothes off to be a star is: baby, once you've boned, what's left to create an illusion?

Let 'em wonder.I never believed in givin' 'em too much of me. I'm my own original creation. I concentrate on myself most of the time. That's the only way a person can become a star in the true sense. I never wanted a love that meant surrender of my self-possession. I saw what it did to other people when they loved another person the way I loved myself, and I didn't want that problem. I had to stay in command of my career. [on her popularity within the gay community] They're crazy about me 'cause I give 'em a chance to play. My character is sexy and with humor and they like to imitate me, the things I say, the way I say 'em, the way I move. It's easy for'em to imitate me 'cause the gestures are exaggerated, flamboyant, sexy, and that's what they want to look like, feel like. And I've stood up for 'em. They're good kids.

I don't like the police abusin' 'em, and in New York I told 'em, 'When you're hittin' one of those guys, you're hittin' a woman, 'cause a born homosexual is a female in a male body. Almost anything goes, anywhere, if it is good and fast and amusing. Risque material is only offensive if badly done, without style and charm. I brought my own sophisticated ideas and style to the vaudeville stage but I had to adjust it to the standard of each theatre, and even to each night's audience.. The theatre manager,if he was a man with experience and knew his business, could usually tell me what the people in town were like, and what the difference in audiences was on other nights.I usually found that one night a week you would get a top society crowd, and another night you'd get mostly working-class people. Other nights there would be family groups - especially on Friday nights when the kids didn't have to go to school the next day. Saturday nights everybody was out for a good time, so audiences were both mixed and terrific. Between two evils, I always pick the one I never tried before.

Virtue has its own reward, but has no sale at the box office. I was in the office at Paramount, and they gave me a large book with a lot of photographs of different leading men, and I was sitting at a table or a desk right near the window and the door, and uh, after I looked at a few I kind of glanced out the window and I saw this good-looking guy walk across the street. So, I said, "That's about the best-looking thing in Hollywood: who is he?" So they looked, and they said, "Oh, that's Cary Grant. We haven't used him in a picture as yet, but we made tests of him with some of the starlets." I said, "Well, if this guy can talk, I'll take him." So they called him in, and we met, and he said, "How d'ya do?" and I said, "OK." And they said, "What part?" and I said, "The lead, of course." So he got the lead. 'Beulah peel me a grape'. Salary (5)

Question: Which American actress said of marriage "It's a great institution, but I'm not ready for an institution yet"?
Answer: MAE WEST