A fool thinks himself to be wise, but a wise man knows himself to be a fool.
William Shakespeare
A jest's prosperity lies in the ear of him that hears it, Never in the tongue of him that makes it.
William Shakespeare
A peace is of the nature of a conquest; for then both parties nobly are subdued, and neither party loser.
William Shakespeare
Absence doth sharpen love, presence strengthens it; the one brings fuel, the other blows it till it burns clear.
William Shakespeare
Absence from those we love is self from self - a deadly banishment.
William Shakespeare
Alas, how love can trifle with itself!
William Shakespeare
Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him Horatio, a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy...
William Shakespeare
All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players: they have their exits and their entrances; and one man in his time plays many parts, his acts being seven ages.
William Shakespeare
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff.
William Shakespeare
And summer's lease hath all too short a date.
William Shakespeare
And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.
William Shakespeare
And this, our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything.
William Shakespeare
April hath put a spirit of youth in everything.
William Shakespeare
Art made tongue-tied by authority.
William Shakespeare
As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods; They kill us for their sport.
William Shakespeare
As he was valiant, I honour him. But as he was ambitious, I slew him.
William Shakespeare
As soon go kindle fire with snow, as seek to quench the fire of love with words.
William Shakespeare
At Christmas I no more desire a rose Than wish a snow in May's new-fangled mirth; But like of each thing that in season grows.
William Shakespeare
At first the infant, mewling and puking in the nurse's arms. And then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel, and shining morning face, creeping like snail unwillingly to school.
William Shakespeare
Be not afraid of greatness: some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them.
William Shakespeare
Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.
William Shakespeare
Beauty is all very well at first sight; but whoever looks at it when it has been in the house three days?
William Shakespeare
Being born is like being kidnapped. And then sold into slavery.
William Shakespeare
Better a witty fool than a foolish wit.
William Shakespeare
Better three hours too soon than a minute too late.
William Shakespeare
Boldness be my friend.
William Shakespeare
Brevity is the soul of wit.
William Shakespeare
But when they seldom come, they wished for come.
William Shakespeare
But will they come when you do call for them?
William Shakespeare
By that sin fell the angels.
William Shakespeare
Care I for the limb, the thews, the stature, bulk, and big assemblance of a man! Give me the spirit.
William Shakespeare
Ceremony was but devised at first to set a gloss on faint deeds, hollow welcomes, recanting goodness, sorry ere 'Tis shown; but where there is true friendship, there needs none.
William Shakespeare
Children wish fathers looked but with their eyes; fathers that children with their judgment looked; and either may be wrong.
William Shakespeare
Concerning God, free will and destiny: Of all that earth has been or yet may be, all that vain men imagine or believe, or hope can paint or suffering may achieve, we descanted.
William Shakespeare
Confusion now hath made his masterpiece.
William Shakespeare
Cowards die many times before their deaths; the valiant never taste of death but once.
William Shakespeare
Cudgel thy brains no more about it.
William Shakespeare
Days of absence, sad and dreary, Clothed in sorrow's dark array, Days of absence, I am weary; She I love is far away.
William Shakespeare
Death where is thy sting? Love, where is thy glory?
William Shakespeare
Desire of having is the sin of covetousness.
William Shakespeare
Dost thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale?
William Shakespeare
Doubt that the stars are fire, doubt that the sun doth move, doubt truth to be a liar, but never doubt I love.
William Shakespeare
Everyone ought to bear patiently the results of his own conduct.
William Shakespeare
Exceeds man's might: that dwells with the gods above.
William Shakespeare
Expectation is the root of all heartache.
William Shakespeare
False face must hide what the false heart doth know.
William Shakespeare
Fame lulls the fever of the soul, and makes Us feel that we have grasp'd an immortality.
William Shakespeare
Farewell, fair cruelty.
William Shakespeare
Fishes live in the sea, as men do a-land; the great ones eat up the little ones.
William Shakespeare
For my part, it was Greek to me.
William Shakespeare
Fortune brings in some boats that are not steered.
William Shakespeare
Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice.
William Shakespeare
Give me my robe, put on my crown; I have Immortal longings in me.
William Shakespeare
Go to you bosom: Knock there, and ask your heart what it doth know.
William Shakespeare
God has given you one face, and you make yourself another.
William Shakespeare
Having nothing, nothing can he lose.
William Shakespeare
He does it with better grace, but I do it more natural.
William Shakespeare
He is winding the watch of his wit; by and by it will strike.
William Shakespeare
He lives in fame that died in virtue's cause.
William Shakespeare
He makes a swan-like end, fading in music.
William Shakespeare
He that is giddy thinks the world turns round.
William Shakespeare
He that loves to be flattered is worthy o' the flatterer.
William Shakespeare
He wears his faith but as the fashion of his hat.
William Shakespeare
Heat not a furnace for your foe so hot that it do singe yourself.
William Shakespeare
Hell is empty and all the devils are here.
William Shakespeare
Here is my journey's end, here is my butt, And very sea-mark of my utmost sail.
William Shakespeare
How far that little candle throws its beams! So shines a good dead in a naughty world.
William Shakespeare
How long a time lies in one little word?
William Shakespeare
How now, wit! Whither wander you?
William Shakespeare
How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds makes ill deeds done!
William Shakespeare
How poor are they that have not patience! What wound did ever heal but by degrees?
William Shakespeare
How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless child!
William Shakespeare
I am but mad north-north-west; when the wind is southerly, I know a hawk from a handsaw.
William Shakespeare
I am not bound to please thee with my answer.
William Shakespeare
I bear a charmed life.
William Shakespeare
I can get no remedy against this consumption of the purse: borrowing only lingers and lingers it out, but the disease is incurable.
William Shakespeare
I dote on his very absence.
William Shakespeare
I shall the effect of this good lesson keeps as watchman to my heart.
William Shakespeare
I told you, sir, they were red-hot with drinking; so full of valor that they smote the air, for breathing in their faces, beat the ground for kissing of their feet.
William Shakespeare
I try to forget what happiness was, and when that don't work, I study the stars.
William Shakespeare
I was adored once too.
William Shakespeare
I wasted time, and now doth time waste me.
William Shakespeare
I will name you the degrees. The first, the Retort Courteous; the second, the Quip Modest; the third, the Reply Churlish; the fourth, the Reproof Valiant; the fifth, the Countercheck Quarrelsome; the sixth, the Lie with Circumstance; the seventh, the Lie Direct.
William Shakespeare
I will praise any man that will praise me.
William Shakespeare
If it be a sin to covet honor, I am the most offending soul.
William Shakespeare
If it were done whe 'tis done, there 'twere well it were done quickly.
William Shakespeare
If music be the food of love, play on.
William Shakespeare
If to do were as easy as to know what were good to do, chapels had been churches, and poor men's cottage princes' palaces.
William Shakespeare
If we are marked to die, we are enough to do our country loss; and if to live, the fewer men, the greater share of honor.
William Shakespeare
If you can look into the seeds of time, and say which grain will grow and which will not, speak then unto me.
William Shakespeare
If you have tears, prepare to shed them now.
William Shakespeare
If you prick us do we not bleed? If you tickle us do we not laugh? If you poison us do we not die? And if you wrong us shall we not revenge?
William Shakespeare
If you want to win anything - a race, your self, your life - you have to go a little berserk.
William Shakespeare
Ignorance is the curse of God; knowledge is the wing wherewith we fly to heaven.
William Shakespeare
In a false quarrel there is no true valor.
William Shakespeare
In time we hate that which we often fear.
William Shakespeare
Is it not strange that desire should so many years outlive performance?
William Shakespeare
Is pale cold cowardice in noble breasts.
William Shakespeare
It is a custom. More honored in the breach than the observance.
William Shakespeare
It is a wise father that knows his own child.
William Shakespeare
It is not in the stars to hold our destiny but in ourselves.
William Shakespeare
It is the bright day that brings forth the adder, and that craves wary walking.
William Shakespeare
It provokes the desire but it take away the performance.
William Shakespeare
It will have blood, they say; blood will have blood.
William Shakespeare
Lawless are they that make their wills their law.
William Shakespeare
Let every eye negotiate for itself and trust no agent.
William Shakespeare
Let me embrace thee, sour adversity, for wise men say it is the wisest course.
William Shakespeare
Let no such man be trusted.
William Shakespeare
Life every man holds dear; but the dear man holds honor far more precious dear than life.
William Shakespeare
Life is as tedious as twice-told tale, vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man.
William Shakespeare
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player, that struts and frets his hour upon the stage, and then is heard no more; it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.
William Shakespeare
Like as the waves make towards the pebbl'd shore, so do our minutes, hasten to their end.
William Shakespeare
Lord, Lord, how subject we old men are to this vice of lying!
William Shakespeare
Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none.
William Shakespeare
Love is a smoke made with the fume of sighs.
William Shakespeare
Love is a spirit of all compact of fire.
William Shakespeare
Love is not love that alters when it alteration finds.
William Shakespeare
Love sought is good, but given unsought, is better.
William Shakespeare
Macduff: What three things does drink especially provoke? Porter: Marry, sir, nose-painting, sleep, and urine.
William Shakespeare
Maids want nothing but husbands, and when they have them, they want everything.
William Shakespeare
Many a good hanging prevents a bad marriage.
William Shakespeare
Men are April when they woo, December when they wed. Maids are May when they are maids, but the sky changes when they are wives.
William Shakespeare
Men shut their doors against a setting sun.
William Shakespeare
Mind your speech a little lest you should mar your fortunes.
William Shakespeare
Modest doubt is called the beacon of the wise.
William Shakespeare
Most dangerous is that temptation that doth goad us on to sin in loving virtue.
William Shakespeare
My age is as a lusty winter, frosty but kindly.
William Shakespeare
My crown is called content, a crown that seldom kings enjoy.
William Shakespeare
My library was dukedom large enough.
William Shakespeare
My pride fell with my fortunes.
William Shakespeare
Neither a borrower nor a lender be.
William Shakespeare
No legacy is so rich as honesty.
William Shakespeare
Not wine... men intoxicate themselves; Not vice... men entice themselves.
William Shakespeare
Nothing can come of nothing.
William Shakespeare
Nothing is so common-place as to wish to be remarkable.
William Shakespeare
Now, God be praised, that to believing souls gives light in darkness, comfort in despair.
William Shakespeare
O God, O God, how weary, stale, flat, and unprofitable seem to me all the uses of this world!
William Shakespeare
O God, that men should put an enemy in their mouths to steal away their brains! That we should with joy, pleasance, revel, and applause transform ourselves into beasts!
William Shakespeare
O thou invisible spirit of wine, if thou hast no name to be known by, let us call thee devil.
William Shakespeare
O world, world! thus is the poor agent despised. O traitors and bawds, how earnestly are you set a-work, and how ill requited! Why should our endeavor be so loved, and the performance so loathed?
William Shakespeare
O, had I but followed the arts!
William Shakespeare
O, he sits high in all the people's hearts; And that which would appear offence in us, His countenance, like richest alchemy, Will change to virtue and to worthiness.
William Shakespeare
O! for a muse of fire, that would ascend the brightest heaven of invention.
William Shakespeare
O! Let me not be mad, not mad, sweet heaven; keep me in temper; I would not be mad!
William Shakespeare
O! What a noble mind is here o'erthrown.
William Shakespeare
O' What may man within him hide, though angel on the outward side!
William Shakespeare
Oh, thou hast a damnable iteration, and art indeed able to corrupt a saint. Thou hast done much harm upon me Hal, God forgive thee for it. Before I knew thee Hal, I knew nothing, and now am I, if a man should speak truly, little better than one of the wicked.
William Shakespeare
Oh! it offends me to the soul to hear a robust periwig-pated fellow, tear a passion to tatters, to very rags, to split the ears of the groundlings.
William Shakespeare
Oh! that you could turn your eyes towards the napes of your necks, and make but an interior survey of your good selves.
William Shakespeare
One good deed dying tongueless slaughters a thousand waiting upon that. Our praises are our wages.
William Shakespeare
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.
William Shakespeare
Our doubts are traitors and make us lose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt.
William Shakespeare
Out, out, brief candle! Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player That struts and frets his hour upon the stage and then is heard no more. It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.
William Shakespeare
Parting is such sweet sorrow.
William Shakespeare
Poor and content is rich, and rich enough.
William Shakespeare
Reflection is the business of man; a sense of his state is his first duty: but who remembereth himself in joy? Is it not in mercy then that sorrow is allotted unto us?
William Shakespeare
Rest, rest, perturbed spirit!
William Shakespeare
Romeo, Romeo, wherefore art thou, Romeo? Deny thy father, and refuse thy name...
William Shakespeare
So foul and fair a day I have not seen.
William Shakespeare
So shines a good deed in a weary world.
William Shakespeare
So wise so young, they say, do never live long.
William Shakespeare
Speak the speech, I pray you, as I pronounced 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, Nor do not saw the air too much with your hand, thus; but use all gently.
William Shakespeare
Such seems your beauty still.
William Shakespeare
Suit the action to the word, the word to the action.
William Shakespeare
Suspicion, Discontent, and Strife, Come in for Dowrie with a Wife.
William Shakespeare
Sweet are the uses of adversity which, like the toad, ugly and venomous, wears yet a precious jewel in his head.
William Shakespeare
Sweet are the uses of adversity.
William Shakespeare
Sweet mercy is nobility's true badge.
William Shakespeare
Take a music bath once or twice a week for a few seasons, and you will find that it is to the soul what the water-bath is to the body.
William Shakespeare
Talking isn't doing It is a kind of good deed to say well; and yet words are not deeds.
William Shakespeare
Temptation is the fire that brings up the scum of the heart.
William Shakespeare
The attempt and not the deed confounds us.
William Shakespeare
The cat will mew, and dog will have his day.
William Shakespeare
The course of true love never did run smooth.
William Shakespeare
The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.
William Shakespeare
The empty vessel makes the loudest sound.
William Shakespeare
The evil that men do lives after them;The good is oft interred with their bones.
William Shakespeare
The fashion wears out more apparel than the man.
William Shakespeare
The golden age is before us, not behind us.
William Shakespeare
The lady doth protest too much, methinks.
William Shakespeare
The love of heaven makes one heavenly.
William Shakespeare
The lunatic, the lover, and the poet, are of imagination all compact.
William Shakespeare
The man that hath no music in himself, Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds, Is fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils.
William Shakespeare
The most peaceable way for you, if you do take a thief, is, to let him show himself what he is and steal out of your company.
William Shakespeare
The object of art is to give life a shape.
William Shakespeare
The quality of mercy is not strained; It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven Upon the place beneath. It is twice blessed- It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes.
William Shakespeare
The robbed that smiles, steals something from the thief.
William Shakespeare
The stroke of death is as a lover's pinch, Which hurts and is desired.
William Shakespeare
The tartness of his face sours ripe grapes.
William Shakespeare
The undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveler returns.
William Shakespeare
The valiant never taste of death but once.
William Shakespeare
The very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.
William Shakespeare
The weariest and most loathed worldly life, that age, ache, penury and imprisonment can lay on nature is a paradise, to what we fear of death.
William Shakespeare
The wheel is come full circle.
William Shakespeare
The whirligig of time brings in his revenges.
William Shakespeare
The will of man is by his reason swayed.
William Shakespeare
There is a tide in the affairs of men, Which taken at the flood, leads on to fortune. Omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and in miseries. On such a full sea are we now afloat. And we must take the current when it serves, or lose our ventures.
William Shakespeare
There is no darkness but ignorance.
William Shakespeare
There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.
William Shakespeare
There's no art to find the mind's construction in the face.
William Shakespeare
There's no trust, no faith, no honesty in men; all perjured, all forsworn, all naught, all dissemblers.
William Shakespeare
These earthly godfathers of Heaven's lights, that give a name to every fixed star, have no more profit of their shining nights than those that walk and know not what they are.
William Shakespeare
They do not love that do not show their love.
William Shakespeare
They say miracles are past.
William Shakespeare
Things done well and with a care, exempt themselves from fear.
William Shakespeare
Things won are done, joy's soul lies in the doing.
William Shakespeare
This above all; to thine own self be true.
William Shakespeare
Thou seest I have more flesh than another man, and therefore more frality.
William Shakespeare
Though I look old, yet I am strong and lusty; for in my youth I never did apply hot and rebellious liquors in my blood; and did not, with unbashful forehead, woo the means of weakness and debility: therefore my age is as a lusty winter, frosty but kindly.
William Shakespeare
Though this be madness, yet there is method in't.
William Shakespeare
Thus conscience does make cowards of us all.
William Shakespeare
Time and the hour run through the roughest day.
William Shakespeare
'Tis mad idolatry To make the service greater than the god.
William Shakespeare
'Tis not enough to help the feeble up, but to support them after.
William Shakespeare
'Tis one thing to be tempted, another thing to fall.
William Shakespeare
'Tis the soldier's life to have their balmy slumbers waked with strife.
William Shakespeare
To be, or not to be: that is the question.
William Shakespeare
To fear the worst oft cures the worse.
William Shakespeare
To their right praise and true perfection!
William Shakespeare
To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.
William Shakespeare
Tones that sound, and roar and storm about me until I have set them down in notes.
William Shakespeare
Uneasy lies the head that wears a crown.
William Shakespeare
Use every man after his desert, and who should scape whipping?
William Shakespeare
We cannot conceive of matter being formed of nothing, since things require a seed to start from... Therefore there is not anything which returns to nothing, but all things return dissolved into their elements.
William Shakespeare
We know what we are, but know not what we may be.
William Shakespeare
Weariness can snore upon the flint, when resty sloth finds the down pillow hard.
William Shakespeare
What a piece of work is a man, how noble in reason, how infinite in faculties, in form and moving how express and admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god.
William Shakespeare
What is past is prologue.
William Shakespeare
What's in a name? That which we call a rose by any other name would smell as sweet.
William Shakespeare
When a father gives to his son, both laugh; when a son gives to his father, both cry.
William Shakespeare
When delicate and feeling souls are separated, there is not a feature in the sky, not a movement of the elements, not an aspiration of the breeze, but hints some cause for a lover's apprehension.
William Shakespeare
When sorrows come, they come not single spies, But in battalions.
William Shakespeare
When we are born we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools.
William Shakespeare
Where every something, being blent together turns to a wild of nothing.
William Shakespeare
Where is your ancient courage? You were used to say extremities was the trier of spirits; That common chances common men could bear; That when the sea was calm all boats alike showed mastership in floating.
William Shakespeare
Where painting is weakest, namely, in the expression of the highest moral and spiritual ideas, there music is sublimely strong.
William Shakespeare
Why so large a cost, having so short a lease, does thou upon your fading mansion spend?
William Shakespeare
Why this is very midsummer madness.
William Shakespeare
With as little a web as this will I ensnare as great a fly as Cassio.
William Shakespeare
With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come.
William Shakespeare
Women speak two languages - one of which is verbal.
William Shakespeare
Words without thoughts never to heaven go.
William Shakespeare
Words, words, mere words, no matter from the heart.
William Shakespeare
Your 'if' is the only peace-maker; much virtue in 'if'.
William Shakespeare
Your lordship, though not clean past your youth, have yet some smack of age in you, some relish of the saltness of time.
William Shakespeare
Youth is full of sport, age's breath is short; youth is nimble, age is lame; Youth is hot and bold, age is weak and cold; Youth is wild, and age is tame.
William Shakespeare
|
Type:
Dramatist
Date of Birth:
1564-04-26
Year of Death:
1616
Nationality:
English |
