Hell Hath No Fury Like a Woman Scorned Bible
Many of us presume this quote is biblical while some thought it’s Williams Shakespeare’s.
The expression “Hell hath no fury like a scorned woman” means that no one gets angry like a woman who’s been romantically betrayed.
Some find this saying to be controversial, others sees it as the strength of women. A few sees it as a sexist statement.
What’s the origin of the quote “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned?”
This is an amended version of a line by playwright William Congreve, who flourished around the turn of the eighteenth century.
The right line is “Heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned nor hell a fury like a woman scorned.”
The quote also appeared in Loves last shift or The fool in fashion (1696), a comedy by the English actor, writer and theatre manager, Colley Cobber (1657-1757):
He’s pleased, and smiles to see me Rage the more! But he shall find no Fiend in Hell can match the fury of a disappointed Woman!—Scorned! slighted! dismissed without a parting Pang! Oh torturing thought! May all the Racks Mankind e’er gave our easie Sex, Neglected Love, Decaying Beauty, and hot Raging Lust light on me, if e’re I cease to be the Eternal Plague of his remaining Life, nay, after Death.
The first use of the phrase is found in Terræ-Filius: Or, The secret history of the University of Oxford (1726), by the English satirist and political writer Nicholas Amhurst (1697-1742):
Wednesday, May 8 [1721].
Terræ-Filius’s Advice, &c. continued.
My Lads,
[…]
Have a particular regard how you speak of those gaudy things, which flutter about Oxford in prodigious numbers, in summer time, call’d Toasts; take care how you reflect on their parentage, their condition, their Virtue, or their beauty; ever remembring that of the Poet,
Hell has no Fury like a Woman scorn’d,
Especially when they have spiritual bravoes on their side, and old lecherous bully-backs to revenge their cause on every audacious contemner of Venus and her altars.
terræ filius is a Latin word, meaning a son of the earth. This word was used to define a person of obscure parentage.
At the University of Oxford, the term denote an orator opportuned to make funny and satirical structures in a speech at the Public Act, which is the ceremony to mark the completion of degrees during which theses were publicly defended.
The Act was held in early July and the ceremony encompassed sermons, music and satitical speeches. The last Act took place in 1733.
From the above line, toast refers to the person to whom a company is requested to drink, and who most times become the reigning belle of the season.
The term bully-back represents a bully who’s supportive of another person. Contemner means a hater or scorner.
The expression has occasionally been wrongly attributed to the English playwright and poet, William Shakespeare (1564-1616) Hell hath no fury like a woman—Quoted Shakespeare, got benefit of doubt, published in the Lancaster Guardian and Lancaster Observer of 2nd April 1953:
In a statement to D. C. Cameron Owen said, “The only reason why she has done this is because of jealousy and like the poetry from Shakespeare “Hell hath no fury like a woman scorned.” The long and the short of it is that she threw herself and her money at me.”
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