Quotes By Author
Quotations By William Shakespeare
Absence
Absence from those we love is self from self - a deadly banishment.
Acting
As in a theatre, the eyes of men, After a well-graced actor leaves the stage, Are idly bent on him that enters next, Thinking his prattle to be tedious.
Acting
All the world ’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players.
Action
Be great in act, as you have been in thought.
Adversity
Adversity's sweet milk, philosophy.
Adversity
Sweet are the uses of adversity, Which like the toad, ugly and venomous, Wears yet a precious jewel in his head; And this our life, exempt from public haunt, Find tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, And good in everything.
Ambition
'Tis a common proof, that lowliness is Edward Young ambition's ladder, where to the climber upwards turns his face; but when he once attains the utmost round, he then unto the ladder turns his back, looks into the clouds scorning the base degrees by which he did ascend.
Ambition
Ambition's like a circle on the water, which never ceases to enlarge itself, 'till by broad spreading it disperse to nought.
Ambition
Dreams, indeed, are ambition; for the very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream. And I hold ambition of so airy and light a quality that it is but a shadow's shadow.
Ambition
Vaulting ambition which o'er leaps itself.
Beauty
Honesty coupled to beauty is to have honey a sauce to sugar.
Beauty
What a piece of work is man! How noble in reason; how infinite in faculties; in form and moving, how express and admirable! In action, how like an angel; in apprenhension, how like a god; the beauty of the world the paragon of animals! And yet to me what is this quintessence of dust?
Business
My business was great, and in such a case as mine a man may strain courtesy.
Character
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.
City
What is the city but the people?
Class
True nobility is exempt from fear.
Confusion
Confusion now hath made his masterpiece!
Confusion
The attempt and not the deed confounds us.
Death
The stroke of death is as a lover's pinch, Which hurts and is desired.
Defilement
They that touch pitch will be defiled.
Destiny
Men at some time are masters of their fates:
The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves, that we are underlings.
Diligence
That which ordinary men are fit for, I am qualified in. and the best of me is diligence.
Discretion
I have seen the day of wrong through the little hole of discretion, and I will right myself like a soldier.
Discretion
Let's teach ourselves that honorable stop, Not to outsport discretion.
Discretion
The better part of valour is discretion.
Doubt
Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win by fearing to attempt.
Duty
My noble father, I do perceive here a divided duty.
Eternity
He wants nothing of a god but eternity and a heaven to throne in.
Fame
He lives in fame that died in virtue's cause. -- William Shakespeare
Father
It is a wise father that knows his own child. -- William Shakespeare
Fear
Things done well and with a care, exempt themselves from fear.
Fool
The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself a fool.
Happiness
But O, how bitter a thing it is to look into happiness through another man's eyes.
Heaven
The love of heaven makes one heavenly. -- William Shakespeare
Honesty
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
Husband
Maids want nothing but husbands, and when they have them, they want everything. -- William Shakespeare
Hypocrisy
With devotion's visage and pious action we do sugar o'er the devil himself. -- William Shakespeare, Hamlet
Ignorance
Ignorance is the curse of God; knowledge is the wing wherewith we fly to heaven.
Independence
I do desire we may be better strangers.
Individuality
Those that are good manners at thecourt are as ridiculed in the country, as the behavior of the country is most mockable atthe court.
Love
Down on your knees, and thank heaven, fasting, for a good man's love. (As You Like It)
Love
Love is a spirit of all compact of fire.
Love
Love is a smoke made with the fume of sighs,
Being purged, a fire sparkling in lovers' eyes,
Being vexed, a sea nourished with lovers' tears.
What is it else? A madness most discreet,
A choking gall and a preserving sweet.
Love
Love looks not with the eyes, but with the mind;
And therefore is winged Cupid painted blind.
Love
Love sought is good, but given unsought, is better.
Love
The course of true love never did run smooth.
Love
They do not love that do not show their love.
Marriage
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.
Music
The man that hath no music in himself, Nor is not moved with concord of sweet sounds, Is fit for treasons, stratagems and spoils.
Nothing
Where every something, being blent together turns to a wild of nothing.
Order
Fishes live in the sea, as men do a-land; the great ones eat up the little ones. -- William Shakespeare
Patience
My patience to his fury, and am arm'd to suffer, with a quietness of spirit, the very tyranny and rage of his.
Philosophy
For there was never yet a philosopher that could endure the toothache patiently.
Pride
There is not one wise man in twenty that will praise himself.
Sleep
Weariness can snore upon the flint, when resty sloth finds the down pillow hard.
Sorrow
When sorrows come, they come not single spies, But in battalions. -- William Shakespeare
Success
To climb steep hills requires slow pace at first.
Success
The very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.
Success
Ambition should be made of sterner stuff.
Temptation
Most dangerous is that temptation that doth goad us on to sin in loving virtue.
Thoughts
Thought is free.
Thoughts
There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so. -- William Shakespeare
Want
Desire of having is the sin of covetousness.
Want
I have more care to stay than will to go.
Will
Lawless are they that make their wills their law. -- William Shakespeare
Women
Kindness in women, not their beauteous looks, shall win my love.
Work
O, how full of briers is this working-day world!