S. Austin Allibone, comp. Prose Quotations from Socrates to Macaulay. 1880.
Raillery
A quotation from Hudibras shall make them treat with levity an obligation wherein their welfare is concerned as to this world and the next: raillery of this nature is enough to make the hearer tremble.
I do not know anything which gives greater disturbance to conversation than the false notion some people have of raillery. It ought, certainly, to be the first point to be aimed at in society, to gain the good will of those with whom you converse: the way to that is, to show you are well inclined towards them. What then can be more absurd than to set up for being extremely sharp and biting, as the term is, in your expressions to your familiars? A man who has no good quality but courage is in a very ill way towards making an agreeable figure in the world, because that which he has superior to other people cannot be exerted without raising himself an enemy. Your gentleman of a satirical turn is in the like condition.