witty and acute sayings, which commonly signify something further than what their mere words at first sight seem to import. Writers on rhetoric speak of divers species of argutiae, viz.

*Argutiae ab alieno*, when something is said, which seems repugnant either to the nature and property of a thing, or to common custom, the laws, &c., which yet in reality is consistent therewith; or when something is given as a reason of another, which yet is not the reason of it. For instance, *Si Coius nihil didicisset, erassem minus*; again, *Aureum hoc seculum est, quia plerimus jam auro honos venit*.

*Argutiae ab allusione*, those wherein allusion is made to some history, fable, sentence, proverb or the like; e.g. *Multi umbrae captant et carmen emitunt*.

*Argutiae a comparatione*, when two things are compared together, which yet at first sight appear very different from each other, but so as to make a pretty kind of simile or dissimile; e.g. *Par est pauper nil cupiens principi omnia habenti*.

*Argutiae a repugnantiis*, when two things meet in a subject, which yet regularly cannot be therein; or when two things are opposed to each other, yet the epithet of the one is attributed to the other, e.g. *Dum tacent clamant*.