| John Bartlett (1820–1905). Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. 1919. |
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| NUMBER: | 30 |
| AUTHOR: | Geoffrey Chaucer (c. 1340–1400) |
| QUOTATION: | I hold a mouses wit not worth a leke,
That hath but on hole for to sterten to. 1 |
| ATTRIBUTION: | Canterbury Tales. The Wif of Bathes Prologue. Line 6154. |
| BIOGRAPHY: | Columbia Encyclopedia. |
| | Note 1.
Consider the little mouse, how sagacious an animal it is which never entrusts his life to one hole only.—Plautus: Truculentus, act iv. sc. 4.
The mouse that always trusts to one poor hole
Can never be a mouse of any soul.
Alexander Pope: Paraphrase of the Prologue, line 298. [back] |
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