_PREFACE_
_Until some fortunate being—wit, student, and man of the world (he
will have to be all three)—can, in a cunningly chosen library, write
the history of the Epigram, and the birth and growth of epigrammatic
thought, we shall always be in doubt as to what an epigram is, and most
people will be in doubt as to where the best epigrams are. The word
itself is as difficult to define as its own essences—wit, humour,
style, etc. We recognise the epigram when uttered or printed just as
swiftly as we recognise beauty in a woman, yet rarely can we describe
either. The sheer study that awaits the historian of the Epigram
has, doubtless, been a great deterrent; he would have to consider
epigrams from the Bible and the apocryphal writings downwards! In
“Woman and the Wits” I have brought together some of the wisest,
wittiest, and tenderest epigrams, proverbs, axioms, adages or short,
pithy sentences—call them what you will—relating to the woman and
women, and also to the passions, affections, sentiments, and emotions
generally._
_My thanks are due principally to Mr. Morton and Mr. Du Bois for many
excellent epigrams and for hints as to arrangement._
_G. F. MONKSHOOD._
_London, 1899._