Quotes by William Shakespeare

When devils will the blackest sins put onThey do suggest at first with heavenly shows

What is a man, if his chief good and market of his time be but to sleep and feed? a beast, no more. Sure he that made us with such large discourse, looking before and after, gave us not that capability and god-like reason to fust in us unused.

My noble father,I do perceive here a divided duty.To you I am bound for life and education.My life and education both do learn meHow to respect you. You are the lord of my duty,I am hitherto your daughter. But here’s my husband,And so much duty as my mother showedTo you, preferring you before her father,So much I challenge that I may professDue to the Moor my lord.

No beast so fierce but knows some touch of pity. But I know none, and therefore am no beast.

If I had a thousand sons, the first humane principle I would teach them should be to forswear thin potations and to addict themselves to sack.

O, beware, my lord, of jealousy;It is the green-eyd monster, which doth mockThe meat it feeds on.

O, beware, my lord, of jealousy;It is the green-eyd monster, which doth mockThe meat it feeds on. That cuckold lives in bliss,Who, certain of his fate, loves not his wronger:But O, what damnèd minutes tells he oerWho dotes, yet doubts, suspects, yet strongly loves!(Act 3, scene 3, 165–171)

Trifles light as air are to the jealous confirmations strong as proofs of holy writ.

Eye of newt, and toe of frog, Wool of bat, and tongue of dog, Adders fork, and blind-worms sting, Lizards leg, and owlets wing,— For a charm of powerful trouble, Like a hell-broth boil and bubble. Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn, and caldron bubble.

The Weird Sisters, hand in hand,Posters of the sea and land,Thus do go, about, about,Thrice to thine, thrice to mine,And thrice again to make up nine.Peace, the charms wound up.

How sweet the moonlight sleeps upon this bank!Here will we sit and let the sounds of musicCreep in our ears: soft stillness and the nightBecome the touches of sweet harmony.Sit, Jessica. Look how the floor of heavenIs thick inlaid with patines of bright gold:Theres not the smallest orb which thou beholdstBut in his motion like an angel sings,Still quiring to the young-eyed cherubins;Such harmony is in immortal souls;But whilst this muddy vesture of decayDoth grossly close it in, we cannot hear it.- Lorenzo, Acte V, Scene 1

Pour on, I will endure.

The lunatic, the lover, and the poetAre of imagination all compact:One sees more devils than vast hell can hold,That is, the madman: the lover, all as frantic,Sees Helens beauty in a brow of Egypt:The poets eye, in a fine frenzy rolling,Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven,And as imagination bodies forthThe forms of things unknown, the poets penTurns them to shapes and gives to airy nothingA local habitation and a name.

So many horrid Ghosts.

From this day to the ending of the world,But we in it shall be remembered-We few, we happy few, we band of brothers;For he to-day that sheds his blood with meShall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,This day shall gentle his condition;And gentlemen in England now-a-bedShall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaksThat fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.

Romeo: I dreamt a dream tonight.Mercutio: And so did I.Romeo: Well, what was yours?Mercutio: That dreamers often lie.

Benvolio: What sadness lengthens Romeos hours?Romeo: Not having that, which, having, makes them short.

...and when he dies, cut him out in little stars, and the face of heaven will be so fine that all the world will be in love with night and pay no heed to the garish sun.

You speak an infinite deal of nothing.

These violent delights have violent endsAnd in their triump die, like fire and powderWhich, as they kiss, consume