when insults had class]

       The exchange between Churchill & Lady Astor:
      She said, "If you were my husband I'd poison your tea."
      He said, "If you were my wife, I'd drink it."

      A member of Parliament to Disraeli: "Sir, you will either die on the
gallows or of some unspeakable disease."
      "That depends, Sir," said Disraeli, "whether I embrace your policies
or your mistress."

      "He had delusions of adequacy." - Walter Kerr

      "He has all the virtues I dislike and none of the vices I admire."
- Winston Churchill

      "I have never killed a man, but I have read many obituaries with
great pleasure."
      Clarence Darrow

      "He has never been known to use a word that might send a reader to
the dictionary." - William Faulkner (about Ernest Hemingway).

      "Thank you for sending me a copy of your book; I'll waste no time
reading it."
      - Moses Hadas

      "I didn't attend the funeral, but I sent a nice letter saying I
approved of it." - Mark Twain

"He has no enemies, but is intensely disliked by his friends.." -
Oscar Wilde

  "I am enclosing two tickets to the first night of my new play; bring
a friend.... if you have one." - George Bernard Shaw to Winston
Churchill
      "Cannot possibly attend first night, will attend second... if there
is one." - Winston Churchill, in response.

      "I feel so miserable without you; it's almost like having you here."
- Stephen Bishop

      "He is a self-made man and worships his creator." - John Bright

      "I've just learned about his illness. Let's hope it's nothing
trivial." - Irvin S. Cobb

      "He is not only dull himself; he is the cause of dullness in
others." - Samuel Johnson

      "He is simply a shiver looking for a spine to run up." - Paul Keating

      "In order to avoid being called a flirt, she always yielded easily."
- Charles, Count Talleyrand

      "He loves nature in spite of what it did to him." - Forrest Tucker

      "Why do you sit there looking like an envelope without any address
on it?" - Mark Twain

      "His mother should have thrown him away and kept the stork." -  Mae
West

      "Some  cause happiness wherever they go; others, whenever they go."
- Oscar Wilde

      "He uses statistics as a drunken man uses lamp-posts.. . for support
 rather than illumination." - Andrew Lang (1844-1912)

      "He has Van Gogh's ear for music." - Billy Wilder

      "I've had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it." -
Groucho Marx