William Shakespeare on Fate
1564–1616 England
← All quotes by William Shakespeare
27 quotes
What, will the line stretch out to the crack of doom?
What fates impose, that men must needs abide;
It boots not to resist both wind and tide.
Fate, show thy force; ourselves we do not owe;
What is decreed must be, and be this so.
But yet I'll make assurance double sure,
And take a bond of fate: thou shalt not live.
Let Hercules himself do what he may,
The cat will mew and dog will have his day.
Things at the worst will cease or else climb upward
To what they were before.
If he had been as you and you as he,
You would have slipt like him.
For it is a knell
That summons thee to heaven or to hell.
My fate cries out,
And makes each petty artery in this body
As hardy as the Numean lion's nerve.
What should be spoken here, where our fate,
Hid within an auger-hole, may rush, and seize us?
Here burns my candle out; ay, here it dies,
Which, whiles it lasted, gave King Henry light.
If thou read this, O Cæsar, thou mayst live;
If not, the Fates with traitors do contrive.
But, O vain boast!
Who can control his fate?
As the old hermit of Prague … said,… "That that is, is."
Think you I bear the shears of destiny?
Have I commandment on the pulse of life?
Attribution
Quotes and notes from Wikiquote: William Shakespeare (page history), available under CC BY-SA 4.0.