William Shakespeare Quotes

1564–1616 England

William Shakespeare (26 April 1564 (baptised) – 23 April 1616) was an English poet, playwright, and actor, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's pre-eminent dramatist.

England
Actors
Playwrights
Poets

Also known as: Shakespeare, Shakespeare, William, Shakespearean, Shakspeare

Random William Shakespeare quote

2,353 quotes

You taught me language; and my profit on't
Is, I know how to curse. The red plague rid you
For learning me your language!

Where the bee sucks, there suck I;
In a cowslip's bell I lie;
There I couch when owls do cry.
On the bat's back I do fly.

Thou art a cobbler, art thou?
Truly, sir, all that I live by is with the awl: * * * I am indeed, sir, a surgeon to old shoes.

Julius Cæsar (1599)

I am not mad; I would to heaven I were!
For then, 'tis like I should forget myself:
O, if I could, what grief should I forget!

King John (1598)

You know that love
Will creep in service where it cannot go.

The incessant care and labour of his mind
Hath wrought the mure that should confine it in
So thin that life looks through and will break out.

Here comes Monsieur le Beau
With his mouth full of news,
Which he will put on us, as pigeons feed their young.
Then shall we be news-crammed.

How my achievements mock me!
I will go meet them.

Troilus and Cressida (1602)

O, thy vile lady!
She has robbed me of my sword.

Roses have thorns, and silver fountains mud;
Clouds and eclipses stain both moon and sun,
And loathsome canker lives in sweetest bud.
All men make faults.

Will all great Neptune's ocean wash this blood
Clean from my hand? No, this my hand will rather
The multitudinous seas incardine,
Making the green one red.

Thy eyes' windows fall,
Like death, when he shuts up the day of life;
Each part, depriv'd of supple government,
Shall, stiff and stark and cold, appear like death.

Romeo and Juliet (1597)

Can it be
That modesty may more betray our sense
Than woman's lightness? Having waste ground enough,
Shall we desire to raze the sanctuary
And pitch our evils there?

Measure for Measure (1603)

Sleep that knits up the ravell'd sleave of care,
The death of each day's life, sore labour's bath,
Balm of hurt minds, great nature's second course,
Chief nourisher in life's feast.

Macbeth (1605)

Neither a borrower nor a lender be;
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
This above all: to thine ownself be true.
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.

Hamlet (1600)

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,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in every thing.

All days are nights to see till I see thee,
And nights bright days when dreams do show thee me.

O, I were damn'd beneath all depth in hell,
But that I did proceed upon just grounds
To this extremity.

Othello (1603)

But now behold,
In the quick forge and working-house of thought,
How London doth pour out her citizens!

Henry V (1599)

You, mistress,
That have the office opposite to Saint Peter,
And keeps the gate of hell!

Attribution

Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: William Shakespeare (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.