Revenge

Posted by ESC on February 16, 2000

In Reply to: Living well is best revenge posted by Pamela on February 15, 2000

: I am searching for the origin and meaning of this phrase....can anyone help?

Living well is the best revenge. Attributed to George Herbert, (1593-1633) "Jacula Prudentum."

Here's my interpretation. A man and a woman. The man is a huge jerk and hurts the woman terribly. She goes on to earn her master's degree, achieves fame and fortune, marries a loving man, and has twins.

She has lived well, gone beyond the hurt. He, on the other hand, is still the sniveling miserable jerk he always was. The woman doesn't think of the man very often. But when she does, it is with a sense of having been avenged for the trouble he caused her. She "got even" by living well. Scraped him off her shoe and went on.

There's another good quote along those lines, but I can't remember who said it. "Revenge is a dish best eaten cold." Someone does you a wrong, but you've moved on and don't care very much about it. It's past history. If you heard the person came to a bad end, it's very sweet indeed. Better than if the revenge came when the anger was still hot.