Dramatist · English · 1564 – 1616 · 209 quotes
How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is to have a thankless child!
William Shakespeare
Dramatist · English · 1564 – 1616
Go to you bosom: Knock there, and ask your heart what it doth know.
O' What may man within him hide, though angel on the outward side!
Suit the action to the word, the word to the action.
When words are scarce they are seldom spent in vain.
Maids want nothing but husbands, and when they have them, they want everything.
And oftentimes excusing of a fault doth make the fault the worse by the excuse.
'Tis not enough to help the feeble up, but to support them after.
The fashion of the world is to avoid cost, and you encounter it.
Our peace shall stand as firm as rocky mountains.
'Tis better to bear the ills we have than fly to others that we know not of.
Use every man after his desert, and who should scape whipping?
There was never yet fair woman but she made mouths in a glass.
Well, if Fortune be a woman, she's a good wench for this gear.
The undiscovered country from whose bourn no traveler returns.
No, I will be the pattern of all patience; I will say nothing.
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.
O! for a muse of fire, that would ascend the brightest heaven of invention.
Lord, Lord, how subject we old men are to this vice of lying!
God hath given you one face, and you make yourselves another.
As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods; they kill us for their sport.
Mind your speech a little lest you should mar your fortunes.
One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.
How well he's read, to reason against reading!
Come, gentlemen, I hope we shall drink down all unkindness.
I see that the fashion wears out more apparel than the man.
God has given you one face, and you make yourself another.
Where every something, being blent together turns to a wild of nothing.
But men are men; the best sometimes forget.
When we are born we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools.
Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice.
Poor and content is rich, and rich enough.
As he was valiant, I honour him. But as he was ambitious, I slew him.
The lunatic, the lover, and the poet, are of imagination all compact.
The empty vessel makes the loudest sound.
Love is not love that alters when it alteration finds.
Let every eye negotiate for itself and trust no agent.
Exceeds man's might: that dwells with the gods above.
False face must hide what the false heart doth know.
When sorrows come, they come not single spies, but in battalions.
Heat not a furnace for your foe so hot that it do singe yourself.
There's not a note of mine that's worth the noting.
Love sought is good, but given unsought, is better.
Everyone ought to bear patiently the results of his own conduct.
How oft the sight of means to do ill deeds makes ill deeds done!
Lawless are they that make their wills their law.
What, man, defy the devil. Consider, he's an enemy to mankind.
There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.
