Quotes from Jonathan Swift, 1710

...and it often happens, that if a lie be believed only for an hour, it hath done its work... Falsehood flies, and the Truth comes limping after it; so that when men come to be undeceived, it is too late; the jest is over, and the tale has had its effect: like a man, who has thought of a good repartee, when the discourse has changed; or the company parted; or like a physician, who hath found out an infallible medicine, after the patient is dead.