William Shakespeare Quotes

We do pray for mercy, and that same prayer doth teach us all to render the deeds of mercy.

There is a history in all men's lives.

Poor and content is rich, and rich enough.

When workmen strive to do better than well, they do confound their skill in covetousness.

To lapse in fulness Is sorer than to lie for need, and falsehood Is worse in kings than beggars.

Nothing is so common as the wish to be remarkable.(attributed to)

I dote on his very absence.

Here, thou incestuous, murderous, damned Dane, Drink off this potion!

The web of our life is of a mingled yarn, good and ill together: our virtues would be proud if our faults whipped them not; and our crimes would despair if they were not cherished by our own virtues.

I am a true laborer: I earn that I eat, get that I wear, owe no man hate, envy no man's happiness, glad of other men's good, content with my harm.

For thou hast given me in this beauteous face A world of earthly blessings to my soul, If sympathy of love unite our thoughts.

That which ordinary men are fit for, I am qualified in. and the best of me is diligence.

Love bears it out even to the edge of doom.

By that sin fell the angels.

He is deformed, crooked, old and sere, Ill-faced, worse bodied, shapeless everywhere; Vicious, ungentle, foolish, blunt, unkind; Stigmatical in making, worse in mind.

They have a plentiful lack of wit.

The prize of all too precious you.

The rarer action is in virtue than in vengeance.

More matter with less art.

And his unkindness may defeat my life, But never taint my love.

This day's black fate on more days doth depend; This but begins the woe, others must end.

Now is the winter of our discontent Made glorious summer by this sun of York; And all the clouds that lour'd upon our house In the deep bosom of the ocean buried.

Light seeking light doth light of light beguile: So, ere you find where light in darkness lies, Your light grows dark by losing of your eyes.

O, when she's angry, she is keen and shrewd! She was a vixen when she went to school; And though she be but little, she is fierce.

Sometimes we are devils to ourselves When we will tempt the frailty of our powers, Presuming on their changeful potency.

Patch up thine old body for heaven.

My thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical, Shakes so my single state of man That function is smothered in surmise, And nothing is but what is not.

To offend and judge are distinct offices, And of opposed natures.

Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounce it to you, trippingly on the tongue; but if you mouth it, as many of your players do, I had as lief the town-crier spoke my lines.

He is not worthy of the honey-comb, that shuns the hives because the bees have stings.

Quote: What angel wakes me from my flowery bed?

When words are scarce they are seldom spent in vain.

Woe to that land that's governed by a child.

So our virtues lie in the interpretation of the time

Until I know this sure uncertainty, I'll entertain the offered fallacy.

What valor were it, when a cur doth grin, for one to thrust his hand between his teeth, when he might spurn him with his foot away?

O, it is excellent To have a giant's strength; but it is tyrannous To use it like a giant.

I understand a fury in your words But not your words.

Music, moody food Of us that trade in love.

The truest poetry is the most feigning.

People’s good deeds we write in water. The evil deeds are etched in brass.

For Brutus, as you know, was Caesar's angel: Judge, O you gods, how dearly Caesar loved him! This was the most unkindest cut of all

So may the outward shows be least themselves; The world is still deceived with ornament.

But I will be, A bridegroom in my death, and run into't As to a lover's bed.

The end crowns all, And that old common arbitrator, Time, Will one day end it.

I love a ballad but even too well if it be doleful matter merrily set down, or a very pleasant thing indeed and sung lamentably.

I had rather be a kitten and cry mew Than one of these same metre ballet-mongers.

If thou couldst, doctor, cast The water of my land, find her disease, And purge it to a sound and pristine health, I would applaud thee to the very echo, That should applaud you again.

I have been long a sleeper; but I trust My absence doth neglect no great design Which by my presence might have been concluded.

Man, proud man, drest in a little brief authority, most ignorant of what he's most assur d, glassy essence, like an angry ape, plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven, as make the angels weep.