Q. What are the five greatest rarities to be found in the world?
A. A black Swan, a Phœnix, an Unicorn, the Philosophers’ Stone, and a maiden at sixteen.
Q. What is the greatest folly that sensible people can be guilty of?
A. To go to law about trifles, for whatever way the plea end, the lawyers will be the greatest gainers.
Q. Who has the honestest trade in the world?
A. Ballad-singers; for they always deal with ready-money: and it is as ancient as the Siege of Troy, for Homer was a ballad-singer.
Q. What is the surest method for one to become both rich and respectable?
A. To be sober and industrious.
Q. What is the best method of overcoming the argument of a positive person?
A. Either to say with him, or give him no answer.