William Shakespeare Quotes

But then I sigh, with a piece of ScriptureTell them that God bids us to do evil for good; And thus I clothe my naked villanyWith odd old ends stolen out of Holy Writ;And seem a saint, when most I play the devil.

~ William Shakespeare

We know what we are, but not what we may be.

~ William Shakespeare

What's in a name? that which we call a roseBy any other name would smell as sweet.

~ William Shakespeare

He that commends me to mine own contentCommends me to the thing I cannot get.I to the world am like a drop of waterThat in the ocean seeks another drop,Who, falling there to find his fellow forth,Unseen, inquisitive, confounds himself:So I, to find a mother and a brother,In quest of them, unhappy, lose myself.

~ William Shakespeare

Be as thou wast wont to be.

~ William Shakespeare

Be as thou wast wont to be.See as thou wast wont to see.

~ William Shakespeare

Cucullus non facit monachum; that’s as much to say, as I wear not motley in my brain.

~ William Shakespeare

Journeys end in lovers meeting.

~ William Shakespeare

From forth the fatal loins of these two foes A pair of star-crossed lovers take their life,Whose misadventured piteous overthrows Doth with their death bury their parents’ strife. . . . O, I am fortune’s fool! . . . Then I defy you, stars.

~ William Shakespeare

O Hero, what a Hero hadst thou been.

~ William Shakespeare

Beshrew me but I love her heartily, For she is wise, if I can judge of her, And fair she is, if that mine eyes be true, And true she is, as she hath proved herself: And therefore like herself, wise, fair, and true, Shall she be placed in my constant soul.

~ William Shakespeare

What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet

~ William Shakespeare

Parting is such sweet sorrow

~ William Shakespeare

Good wombs have borne bad sons.-- (Miranda, I:2)

~ William Shakespeare

I cannot live to hear the news from England.But I do prophesy th' election lightsOn Fortinbras; he has my dying voice.So tell him, with th' occurents, more and less,Which have solicited - the rest is silence.

~ William Shakespeare

Fit to govern? No, not fit to live.

~ William Shakespeare

The world is not thy friend, nor the world's law. - Romeo

~ William Shakespeare

Wonder of time,' quoth she, 'this is my spite,That, thou being dead, the day should yet be light.'Since thou art dead, lo, here I prophesy:Sorrow on love hereafter shall attend:It shall be waited on with jealousy,Find sweet beginning, but unsavoury end,Ne'er settled equally, but high or low,That all love's pleasure shall not match his woe.'It shall be fickle, false and full of fraud,Bud and be blasted in a breathing-while;The bottom poison, and the top o'erstraw'dWith sweets that shall the truest sight beguile:The strongest body shall it make most weak,Strike the wise dumb and teach the fool to speak.'It shall be sparing and too full of riot,Teaching decrepit age to tread the measures;The staring ruffian shall it keep in quiet,Pluck down the rich, enrich the poor with treasures;It shall be raging-mad and silly-mild,Make the young old, the old become a child.'It shall suspect where is no cause of fear;It shall not fear where it should most mistrust;It shall be merciful and too severe,And most deceiving when it seems most just;Perverse it shall be where it shows most toward,Put fear to valour, courage to the coward.'It shall be cause of war and dire events,And set dissension 'twixt the son and sire;Subject and servile to all discontents,As dry combustious matter is to fire:Sith in his prime Death doth my love destroy,They that love best their loves shall not enjoy.

~ William Shakespeare

Alack, sir, no; her passions are made of nothing but the finest part of pure love. We cannot call her winds and waters sighs and tears; they are greater storms and tempests than almanacs can report: this cannot be cunning in her; if it be, she makes a shower of rain as well as Jove.

~ William Shakespeare

For it falls outThat what we have we prize not to the worthWhiles we enjoy it, but being lacked and lost,Why, then we rack the value, then we findThe virtue that possession would not show usWhile it was ours.

~ William Shakespeare

For this new-married man approaching here,Whose salt imagination yet hath wrong'dYour well defended honour, you must pardonFor Mariana's sake: but as he adjudged your brother,--Being criminal, in double violationOf sacred chastity and of promise-breachThereon dependent, for your brother's life,--The very mercy of the law cries outMost audible, even from his proper tongue,'An Angelo for Claudio, death for death!'Haste still pays haste, and leisure answers leisure;Like doth quit like, and MEASURE still FOR MEASURE

~ William Shakespeare

I beg for justice, which you, Prince, must give. Romeo killed Tybalt; Romeo must not live.

~ William Shakespeare

Hark, villains! I will grind your bones to dust. (Act V, Scene 2, 2503)

~ William Shakespeare

The gods are just, and of our pleasant vicesMake instruments to plague us.

~ William Shakespeare

Few love to hear the sins they love to act.

~ William Shakespeare

Uncertain way of gain. But I am inSo far in blood that sin will pluck on sin.Tear-falling pity dwells not in this eye.

~ William Shakespeare

Antioch, farewell! for wisdom sees, those men blush not in actions blacker than the night, will 'schew no course to keep them from the light. One sin, I know, another doth provoke; Murder's as near to lust as flame to smoke. Poison and treason are the hands of sin; Ay, and the targets to put off the shame. Then, lest my life be cropped to keep you clear, By flight I'll shun the danger which I fear.

~ William Shakespeare

Who knows himself a braggart, let him fear this, for it will come to pass that every braggart shall be found an ass.

~ William Shakespeare

CARDINAL WOLSEYSo farewell to the little good you bear me.Farewell! a long farewell, to all my greatness!This is the state of man: to-day he puts forthThe tender leaves of hopes; to-morrow blossoms,And bears his blushing honours thick upon him;The third day comes a frost, a killing frost,And, when he thinks, good easy man, full surelyHis greatness is a-ripening, nips his root,And then he falls, as I do. I have ventured,Like little wanton boys that swim on bladders,This many summers in a sea of glory,But far beyond my depth: my high-blown prideAt length broke under me and now has left me,Weary and old with service, to the mercyOf a rude stream, that must for ever hide me.Vain pomp and glory of this world, I hate ye:I feel my heart new open'd. O, how wretchedIs that poor man that hangs on princes' favours!There is, betwixt that smile we would aspire to,That sweet aspect of princes, and their ruin,More pangs and fears than wars or women have:And when he falls, he falls like Lucifer,Never to hope again

~ William Shakespeare

All things are ready, if our mind be so.

~ William Shakespeare

All places that the eye of heaven visits are to a wise man ports and happy havens. Teach thy necessity to reason thus, there is no virtue like necessity.

~ William Shakespeare

GON. How lush and lusty the grass looks! how green!ANT. The ground indeed is tawny.SEB. With an eye of green in 't.ANT. He misses not much.SEB. No, he doth but mistake the truth totally.

~ William Shakespeare

The robb'd that smiles, steals something from the thief.

~ William Shakespeare

I rather would entreat thy companyTo see the wonders of the world abroadThan, living dully sluggardiz'd at home,Wear out thy youth with shapeless idleness.

~ William Shakespeare

Golden lads and girls all must, like chimmney-sweepers, come to dust.

~ William Shakespeare

CLEOPATRA: My salad days,When I was green in judgment: cold in blood,To say as I said then! But, come, away;Get me ink and paper:He shall have every day a several greeting,Or I'll unpeople Egypt.

~ William Shakespeare

We have heard the chimes at midnight, Master Shallow

~ William Shakespeare

such wanton, wild, and usual slips/ As are companions noted and most known/ To youth and liberty.

~ William Shakespeare

Orsino: For, boy, however we do praise ourselves,Our fancies are more giddy and unfirm,More longing, wavering, sooner lost and won,Than women's are. ...For women are as roses, whose fair flow'rBeing once display'd doth fall that very hour.Viola: And so they are; alas, that they are so!To die, even when they to perfection grow!

~ William Shakespeare

There's small choice in rotten apples.

~ William Shakespeare