The Complete Works of William Shakespeare

BENEDICK. That I neither feel how she should be loved, nor know how she should be worthy, is the opinion that fire cannot melt out of me: I will die in it at the stake.

Since I left you, mine eye is in my mind, And that which governs me to go about, Doth part his function, and is partly blind, Seems seeing, but effectually is out: For it no for...

ANTONIO. But little. I am arm’d and well prepar’d. Give me your hand, Bassanio. Fare you well, Grieve not that I am fallen to this for you, For herein Fortune shows herself more...

DON PEDRO. Come, you shake the head at so long a breathing; but, I warrant thee, Claudio, the time shall not go dully by us. I will in the interim undertake one of Hercules’ lab...

SALARINO. Your mind is tossing on the ocean, There where your argosies, with portly sail Like signiors and rich burghers on the flood, Or as it were the pageants of the sea, Do...

ROSALIND. I have been told so of many. But indeed an old religious uncle of mine taught me to speak, who was in his youth an inland man, one that knew courtship too well, for th...

LUCIANA. And may it be that you have quite forgot A husband’s office? Shall, Antipholus, Even in the spring of love, thy love-springs rot? Shall love, in building, grow so ruino...

DUKE. Dear lad, believe it; For they shall yet belie thy happy years, That say thou art a man: Diana’s lip Is not more smooth and rubious; thy small pipe Is as the maiden’s orga...

MERCUTIO. Sure wit, follow me this jest now, till thou hast worn out thy pump, that when the single sole of it is worn, the jest may remain after the wearing, solely singular.

OLIVIA. O what a deal of scorn looks beautiful In the contempt and anger of his lip! A murd’rous guilt shows not itself more soon Than love that would seem hid. Love’s night is...

MALVOLIO. Mistress Mary, if you prized my lady’s favour at anything more than contempt, you would not give means for this uncivil rule; she shall know of it, by this hand.

ARCITE. Let’s think this prison holy sanctuary, To keep us from corruption of worse men. We are young and yet desire the ways of honour; That liberty and common conversation, Th...

OTHELLO. Why, why is this? Think’st thou I’d make a life of jealousy, To follow still the changes of the moon With fresh suspicions? No. To be once in doubt Is once to be resolv...

MISTRESS QUICKLY. [_Aside to Simple_.] I am glad he is so quiet. If he had been throughly moved, you should have heard him so loud and so melancholy. But notwithstanding, man, I...

KING. For all the world As thou art to this hour was Richard then When I from France set foot at Ravenspurgh, And even as I was then is Percy now. Now, by my sceptre, and my sou...

TITUS. It was my dear, and he that wounded her Hath hurt me more than had he killed me dead. For now I stand as one upon a rock, Environed with a wilderness of sea, Who marks th...

ISABELLA. There is a vice that most I do abhor, And most desire should meet the blow of justice; For which I would not plead, but that I must; For which I must not plead, but th...

So are you to my thoughts as food to life, Or as sweet-seasoned showers are to the ground; And for the peace of you I hold such strife As ’twixt a miser and his wealth is found....

PRINCE. Got with much ease. Now merrily to horse. The thieves are all scatter’d, and possess’d with fear So strongly that they dare not meet each other; Each takes his fellow fo...

VERNON. Do me no slander, Douglas; by my life, And I dare well maintain it with my life, If well-respected honour bid me on, I hold as little counsel with weak fear As you, my l...

BRUTUS. I will do so. But, look you, Cassius, The angry spot doth glow on Caesar’s brow, And all the rest look like a chidden train: Calphurnia’s cheek is pale; and Cicero Looks...

KING HENRY. Thou dost thy office fairly. Turn thee back, And tell thy King I do not seek him now, But could be willing to march on to Calais Without impeachment; for, to say the...

FIRST LORD. Sir, his wife some two months since fled from his house. Her pretence is a pilgrimage to Saint Jaques le Grand; which holy undertaking with most austere sanctimony s...

POMPEY. Come, fear not you. Good counsellors lack no clients. Though you change your place, you need not change your trade. I’ll be your tapster still. Courage, there will be pi...

SALARINO. A kinder gentleman treads not the earth. I saw Bassanio and Antonio part, Bassanio told him he would make some speed Of his return. He answered “Do not so, Slubber not...

As a decrepit father takes delight, To see his active child do deeds of youth, So I, made lame by Fortune’s dearest spite Take all my comfort of thy worth and truth. For whether...

CONSTANCE. No, I defy all counsel, all redress, But that which ends all counsel, true redress, Death, death, O amiable, lovely death! Thou odoriferous stench, sound rottenness!...

CAPULET. What, man, ’tis not so much, ’tis not so much: ’Tis since the nuptial of Lucentio, Come Pentecost as quickly as it will, Some five and twenty years; and then we mask’d.

ANTONIO. But O how vile an idol proves this god! Thou hast, Sebastian, done good feature shame. In nature there’s no blemish but the mind; None can be call’d deform’d but the un...

LANCE. Why, I tell thee, I care not though he burn himself in love. If thou wilt, go with me to the alehouse; if not, thou art an Hebrew, a Jew, and not worth the name of a Chri...

DROMIO OF EPHESUS. I am an ass indeed; you may prove it by my long ears. I have served him from the hour of my nativity to this instant, and have nothing at his hands for my ser...

KING. ’Tis only title thou disdain’st in her, the which I can build up. Strange is it that our bloods, Of colour, weight, and heat, pour’d all together, Would quite confound dis...

COUNTESS. Ah, what sharp stings are in her mildest words! Rynaldo, you did never lack advice so much As letting her pass so; had I spoke with her, I could have well diverted her...

JESSICA. When I was with him, I have heard him swear To Tubal and to Chus, his countrymen, That he would rather have Antonio’s flesh Than twenty times the value of the sum That...

QUEEN KATHERINE. O my lord, The times and titles now are altered strangely With me since first you knew me. But I pray you, What is your pleasure with me?

PAULINA. What studied torments, tyrant, hast for me? What wheels? racks? fires? what flaying? boiling In leads or oils? What old or newer torture Must I receive, whose every wor...

ANTONIO. My will is something sorted with his wish. Muse not that I thus suddenly proceed, For what I will, I will, and there an end. I am resolved that thou shalt spend some ti...

Stay, murderous villains, will you kill your brother? Now, by the burning tapers of the sky That shone so brightly when this boy was got, He dies upon my scimitar’s sharp point...

MISTRESS PAGE. Hang him, dishonest varlet! We cannot misuse him enough. We’ll leave a proof, by that which we will do, Wives may be merry and yet honest too. We do not act that...

AUTOLYCUS. Ha, ha! what a fool Honesty is! and Trust, his sworn brother, a very simple gentleman! I have sold all my trumpery. Not a counterfeit stone, not a ribbon, glass, poma...

KING. My Lord Cardinal, I do excuse you; yea, upon mine honour, I free you from’t. You are not to be taught That you have many enemies that know not Why they are so, but, like t...

‘“And, lo! behold these talents of their hair, With twisted metal amorously empleach’d, I have receiv’d from many a several fair, Their kind acceptance weepingly beseech’d, With...

FORD. When I have told you that, I have told you all. Some say that though she appear honest to me, yet in other places she enlargeth her mirth so far that there is shrewd const...

SECOND GENTLEMAN. Nothing but bonfires: the oracle is fulfilled: the king’s daughter is found: such a deal of wonder is broken out within this hour that ballad-makers cannot be...

O, the recorders. Let me see one.—To withdraw with you, why do you go about to recover the wind of me, as if you would drive me into a toil?

NURSE. Faith, here it is. Romeo is banished; and all the world to nothing That he dares ne’er come back to challenge you. Or if he do, it needs must be by stealth. Then, since t...

HORNER. Masters, I am come hither, as it were, upon my man’s instigation, to prove him a knave and myself an honest man; and touching the Duke of York, I will take my death I ne...

KING RICHARD. Ay, no; no, ay; for I must nothing be. Therefore no “no”, for I resign to thee. Now mark me how I will undo myself: I give this heavy weight from off my head, And...

PRINCE. Rebellious subjects, enemies to peace, Profaners of this neighbour-stained steel,— Will they not hear? What, ho! You men, you beasts, That quench the fire of your pernic...

COUNTESS. Nay, a mother. Why not a mother? When I said a mother, Methought you saw a serpent. What’s in mother, That you start at it? I say I am your mother, And put you in the...

PORTER’S MAN. I am not Samson, nor Sir Guy, nor Colbrand, To mow ’em down before me; but if I spared any That had a head to hit, either young or old, He or she, cuckold or cucko...

GRUMIO. I pray you, sir, let him go while the humour lasts. O’ my word, and she knew him as well as I do, she would think scolding would do little good upon him. She may perhaps...

THE SONNETS ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL THE TRAGEDY OF ANTONY AND CLEOPATRA AS YOU LIKE IT THE COMEDY OF ERRORS THE TRAGEDY OF CORIOLANUS CYMBELINE THE TRAGEDY OF HAMLET, PRINCE O...

MELUN. Have I not hideous death within my view, Retaining but a quantity of life, Which bleeds away even as a form of wax Resolveth from his figure ’gainst the fire? What in the...

GUIDERIUS. Out of your proof you speak. We, poor unfledg’d, Have never wing’d from view o’ th’ nest, nor know not What air’s from home. Haply this life is best, If quiet life be...

FIRST CLOWN. Give me leave. Here lies the water; good. Here stands the man; good. If the man go to this water and drown himself, it is, will he nill he, he goes,—mark you that....

BUCKINGHAM. Nay, Sir Nicholas, Let it alone. My state now will but mock me. When I came hither, I was Lord High Constable And Duke of Buckingham; now, poor Edward Bohun. Yet I a...

CLARENCE. O, I have passed a miserable night, So full of fearful dreams, of ugly sights, That, as I am a Christian faithful man, I would not spend another such a night Though ’t...

MARCELLUS. Horatio says ’tis but our fantasy, And will not let belief take hold of him Touching this dreaded sight, twice seen of us. Therefore I have entreated him along With u...

MESSENGER. Royal commanders, be in readiness; For with a band of thirty thousand men Comes Warwick, backing of the Duke of York, And in the towns, as they do march along, Procla...

ROSALIND. I might ask you for your commission. But I do take thee, Orlando, for my husband. There’s a girl goes before the priest, and certainly a woman’s thought runs before he...

PORTIA. You must take your chance, And either not attempt to choose at all, Or swear before you choose, if you choose wrong Never to speak to lady afterward In way of marriage....

OTHELLO. By heaven, I would most gladly have forgot it. Thou said’st (O, it comes o’er my memory, As doth the raven o’er the infected house, Boding to all) he had my handkerchief.

RICHARD. I know so. But, gentle Lady Anne, To leave this keen encounter of our wits, And fall something into a slower method: Is not the causer of the timeless deaths Of these P...

HIPPOLYTA. Farewell, sister. I am like to know your husband ’fore yourself By some small start of time. He whom the gods Do of the two know best, I pray them he Be made your lot.

BOTTOM. That will ask some tears in the true performing of it. If I do it, let the audience look to their eyes. I will move storms; I will condole in some measure. To the rest—y...

CLAUDIO. Ay, but to die, and go we know not where; To lie in cold obstruction, and to rot; This sensible warm motion to become A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit To bathe...

WOLSEY. Till I find more than will or words to do it— I mean your malice—know, officious lords, I dare and must deny it. Now I feel Of what coarse metal ye are moulded, envy! Ho...

JULIET. O, break, my heart. Poor bankrout, break at once. To prison, eyes; ne’er look on liberty. Vile earth to earth resign; end motion here, And thou and Romeo press one heavy...

LAFEW. Out upon thee, knave! dost thou put upon me at once both the office of God and the devil? One brings thee in grace, and the other brings thee out.

YORK. Five men to twenty! Though the odds be great, I doubt not, uncle, of our victory. Many a battle have I won in France Whenas the enemy hath been ten to one. Why should I no...

ARCITE. Not finding in The circuit of my breast any gross stuff To form me like your blazon holds me to This gentleness of answer. ’Tis your passion That thus mistakes, the whic...

KING PHILIP. Now, citizens of Angiers, ope your gates, Let in that amity which you have made; For at Saint Mary’s chapel presently The rites of marriage shall be solemniz’d. Is...

LEONATO. Wherefore! Why, doth not every earthly thing Cry shame upon her? Could she here deny The story that is printed in her blood? Do not live, Hero; do not ope thine eyes; F...

QUEEN. You are most bound to th’ King, Who lets go by no vantages that may Prefer you to his daughter. Frame yourself To orderly solicits, and be friended With aptness of the se...

FALSTAFF. I would you had but the wit, ’twere better than your dukedom. Good faith, this same young sober-blooded boy doth not love me, nor a man cannot make him laugh; but that...

A fever with the absence of her son; A madness, of which her life’s in danger. Heavens, How deeply you at once do touch me! Imogen, The great part of my comfort, gone; my queen...

DORSET. Comfort, dear mother. God is much displeased That you take with unthankfulness His doing. In common worldly things ’tis called ungrateful With dull unwillingness to repa...

PRINCE. Belike then my appetite was not princely got, for, by my troth, I do now remember the poor creature small beer. But indeed, these humble considerations make me out of lo...

KING HENRY. My crown is in my heart, not on my head; Not decked with diamonds and Indian stones, Not to be seen. My crown is called content; A crown it is that seldom kings enjoy.

VIOLA. The captain that did bring me first on shore Hath my maid’s garments. He, upon some action, Is now in durance, at Malvolio’s suit, A gentleman and follower of my lady’s.

LEONTES. No, in good earnest. How sometimes nature will betray its folly, Its tenderness, and make itself a pastime To harder bosoms! Looking on the lines Of my boy’s face, meth...

DUKE. By mine honesty, If she be mad, as I believe no other, Her madness hath the oddest frame of sense, Such a dependency of thing on thing, As e’er I heard in madness.

HOTSPUR. Nor shall it, Harry, for the hour is come To end the one of us, and would to God Thy name in arms were now as great as mine!

FALSTAFF. What! A young knave, and begging! Is there not wars? Is there not employment? Doth not the King lack subjects? Do not the rebels need soldiers? Though it be a shame to...

I know the boy will well usurp the grace, Voice, gait, and action of a gentlewoman; I long to hear him call the drunkard husband; And how my men will stay themselves from laught...

CORIOLANUS. I muse my mother Does not approve me further, who was wont To call them woollen vassals, things created To buy and sell with groats, to show bare heads In congregati...

PROSPERO. What! I say, My foot my tutor? Put thy sword up, traitor; Who mak’st a show, but dar’st not strike, thy conscience Is so possess’d with guilt: come from thy ward, For...

KING HENRY. Here, Fluellen; wear thou this favour for me and stick it in thy cap. When Alençon and myself were down together, I pluck’d this glove from his helm. If any man chal...

FALSTAFF. Divide me like a bribed buck, each a haunch. I will keep my sides to myself, my shoulders for the fellow of this walk, and my horns I bequeath your husbands. Am I a wo...

OTHELLO. Behold, I have a weapon. A better never did itself sustain Upon a soldier’s thigh: I have seen the day That with this little arm and this good sword I have made my way...

AUSTRIA. Upon thy cheek lay I this zealous kiss, As seal to this indenture of my love: That to my home I will no more return, Till Angiers and the right thou hast in France, Tog...

ROMEO. There is thy gold, worse poison to men’s souls, Doing more murder in this loathsome world Than these poor compounds that thou mayst not sell. I sell thee poison, thou has...

ANTONY. I doubt not of your wisdom. Let each man render me his bloody hand. First, Marcus Brutus, will I shake with you; Next, Caius Cassius, do I take your hand. Now, Decius Br...

ACT III Scene I. A field near Frogmore Scene II. A street in Windsor Scene III. A room in Ford’s house Scene IV. A room in Page’s house Scene V. A room in the Garter Inn

In loving thee thou know’st I am forsworn, But thou art twice forsworn to me love swearing, In act thy bed-vow broke and new faith torn, In vowing new hate after new love bearin...

FORTINBRAS. Go, Captain, from me greet the Danish king. Tell him that by his license, Fortinbras Craves the conveyance of a promis’d march Over his kingdom. You know the rendezv...

BORACHIO. Sweet Prince, let me go no farther to mine answer: do you hear me, and let this Count kill me. I have deceived even your very eyes: what your wisdoms could not discove...

A virtuous gentlewoman, mild and beautiful. I hope my master’s suit will be but cold, Since she respects my mistress’ love so much. Alas, how love can trifle with itself! Here i...

COMINIUS. I tell you, he does sit in gold, his eye Red as ’twould burn Rome; and his injury The jailer to his pity. I kneeled before him; ’Twas very faintly he said “Rise”; dism...

TROILUS. Nothing, but our undertakings when we vow to weep seas, live in fire, eat rocks, tame tigers; thinking it harder for our mistress to devise imposition enough than for u...

MESSENGER. Methinks, Being so few and well disposed, they show Great and fine art in nature. He’s white-haired, Not wanton white, but such a manly colour Next to an auburn; toug...

FIRST GUARD. O Caesar, This Charmian lived but now; she stood and spake. I found her trimming up the diadem On her dead mistress; tremblingly she stood, And on the sudden dropped.

Gentlemen, will you go muster men? If I know how or which way to order these affairs Thus disorderly thrust into my hands, Never believe me. Both are my kinsmen. Th’ one is my s...

GENTLEMAN. Something he left imperfect in the state, which since his coming forth is thought of, which imports to the kingdom so much fear and danger that his personal return wa...

KING HENRY. O God of battles! steel my soldiers’ hearts. Possess them not with fear. Take from them now The sense of reckoning, if the opposed numbers Pluck their hearts from th...

MARINA. No, I will rob Tellus of her weed To strew thy green with flowers: the yellows, blues, The purple violets, and marigolds, Shall as a carpet hang upon thy grave, While su...

ROSENCRANTZ. Madam, it so fell out that certain players We o’er-raught on the way. Of these we told him, And there did seem in him a kind of joy To hear of it. They are about th...

GRUMIO. Nathaniel’s coat, sir, was not fully made, And Gabriel’s pumps were all unpink’d i’ the heel; There was no link to colour Peter’s hat, And Walter’s dagger was not come f...

BOLINGBROKE. First—heaven be the record to my speech!— In the devotion of a subject’s love, Tend’ring the precious safety of my prince, And free from other misbegotten hate, Com...

PRINCE. I know you all, and will awhile uphold The unyok’d humour of your idleness. Yet herein will I imitate the sun, Who doth permit the base contagious clouds To smother up h...

POLIXENES. Say there be; Yet nature is made better by no mean But nature makes that mean. So, over that art Which you say adds to nature, is an art That nature makes. You see, s...

IACHIMO. Yours, whom in constancy you think stands so safe. I will lay you ten thousand ducats to your ring that, commend me to the court where your lady is, with no more advant...

BANQUO. Thou hast it now, King, Cawdor, Glamis, all, As the Weird Women promis’d; and, I fear, Thou play’dst most foully for’t; yet it was said It should not stand in thy poster...

DESDEMONA. My mother had a maid call’d Barbary, She was in love, and he she lov’d prov’d mad And did forsake her. She had a song of “willow”, An old thing ’twas, but it express’...

PROVOST. Come, sir, leave me your snatches, and yield me a direct answer. Tomorrow morning are to die Claudio and Barnardine. Here is in our prison a common executioner, who in...

GONZALO. Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of barren ground. Long heath, brown furze, anything. The wills above be done! but I would fain die a dry death.

IAGO. It is merely a lust of the blood and a permission of the will. Come, be a man. Drown thyself? Drown cats and blind puppies. I have professed me thy friend, and I confess m...

BEROWNE. I can but say their protestation over. So much, dear liege, I have already sworn, That is, to live and study here three years. But there are other strict observances: A...

ROSALIND. I have promised to make all this matter even. Keep you your word, O Duke, to give your daughter, You yours, Orlando, to receive his daughter. Keep your word, Phoebe, t...

POLONIUS. Ay, springes to catch woodcocks. I do know, When the blood burns, how prodigal the soul Lends the tongue vows: these blazes, daughter, Giving more light than heat, ext...

BOTTOM. Nay, you must name his name, and half his face must be seen through the lion’s neck; and he himself must speak through, saying thus, or to the same defect: ‘Ladies,’ or,...

BENEDICK. Yet is this no charm for the tooth-ache. Old signior, walk aside with me: I have studied eight or nine wise words to speak to you, which these hobby-horses must not hear.

IAGO. You see this fellow that is gone before, He is a soldier fit to stand by Cæsar And give direction: and do but see his vice, ’Tis to his virtue a just equinox, The one as l...

THALIARD. From him I come With message unto princely Pericles; But since my landing I have understood Your lord has betook himself to unknown travels, My message must return fro...

EXTON. And speaking it, he wishtly looked on me, As who should say “I would thou wert the man That would divorce this terror from my heart”, Meaning the king at Pomfret. Come, l...

GREMIO. No doubt but he hath got a quiet catch. But now, Baptista, to your younger daughter: Now is the day we long have looked for; I am your neighbour, and was suitor first.

JAQUES. A fool, a fool! I met a fool i’ th’ forest, A motley fool. A miserable world! As I do live by food, I met a fool, Who laid him down and basked him in the sun, And railed...

TITINIUS. No, this was he, Messala, But Cassius is no more. O setting sun, As in thy red rays thou dost sink to night, So in his red blood Cassius’ day is set. The sun of Rome i...

Who seeks for better of thee, sauce his palate With thy most operant poison! What is here? Gold? Yellow, glittering, precious gold? No, gods, I am no idle votarist. Roots, you c...

LEPIDUS. Noble friends, That which combined us was most great, and let not A leaner action rend us. What’s amiss, May it be gently heard. When we debate Our trivial difference l...

YOUNG CLIFFORD. Shame and confusion! All is on the rout, Fear frames disorder, and disorder wounds Where it should guard. O war, thou son of hell, Whom angry heavens do make the...

FIRST QUEEN. And that work presents itself to th’ doing. Now ’twill take form; the heats are gone tomorrow. Then, bootless toil must recompense itself With its own sweat. Now he...

LE BEAU. Neither his daughter, if we judge by manners, But yet indeed the smaller is his daughter. The other is daughter to the banished Duke, And here detained by her usurping...

PALAMON. No, no, cousin, I will no more be hidden, nor put off This great adventure to a second trial; I know your cunning and I know your cause. He that faints now, shame take...

AUFIDIUS. Ay, Martius, Caius Martius. Dost thou think I’ll grace thee with that robbery, thy stol’n name Coriolanus, in Corioles? You lords and heads o’ th’ state, perfidiously...

CORIOLANUS. My name is Caius Martius, who hath done To thee particularly and to all the Volsces Great hurt and mischief; thereto witness may My surname Coriolanus. The painful s...

YORK. The time hath been, Would you have been so brief with him, he would Have been so brief with you to shorten you, For taking so the head, your whole head’s length.

MACBETH. I conjure you, by that which you profess, (Howe’er you come to know it) answer me: Though you untie the winds, and let them fight Against the churches; though the yesty...

CLEOPATRA. O sun, Burn the great sphere thou mov’st in! Darkling stand The varying shore o’ th’ world. O Antony, Antony, Antony! Help, Charmian! Help, Iras, help! Help, friends...

KING JOHN. O, when the last account ’twixt heaven and earth Is to be made, then shall this hand and seal Witness against us to damnation! How oft the sight of means to do ill de...

RIVERS. O Pomfret, Pomfret! O thou bloody prison, Fatal and ominous to noble peers! Within the guilty closure of thy walls Richard the Second here was hacked to death; And, for...

LEAR. The King would speak with Cornwall; the dear father Would with his daughter speak, commands, tends, service, Are they inform’d of this? My breath and blood! Fiery? The fie...

DOCTOR. Foul whisp’rings are abroad. Unnatural deeds Do breed unnatural troubles: infected minds To their deaf pillows will discharge their secrets. More needs she the divine th...

CERES. _Earth’s increase, foison plenty, Barns and garners never empty; Vines with clust’ring bunches growing; Plants with goodly burden bowing; Spring come to you at the farthe...

SUFFOLK. Obscure and lowly swain, King Henry’s blood, The honourable blood of Lancaster, Must not be shed by such a jaded groom. Hast thou not kissed thy hand and held my stirru...

KING HENRY. Ay, my good lord—my lord, I should say rather. ’Tis sin to flatter; “good” was little better: “Good Gloucester” and “good devil” were alike, And both preposterous; t...

BRUTUS. Cassius, be content. Speak your griefs softly, I do know you well. Before the eyes of both our armies here, Which should perceive nothing but love from us, Let us not wr...

POLONIUS. Madam, I swear I use no art at all. That he is mad, ’tis true: ’tis true ’tis pity; And pity ’tis ’tis true. A foolish figure, But farewell it, for I will use no art....

FALSTAFF. Peace, good pint-pot; peace, good tickle-brain.—Harry, I do not only marvel where thou spendest thy time, but also how thou art accompanied. For though the camomile, t...

FORD. Pray you come near. If I suspect without cause, why then make sport at me, then let me be your jest; I deserve it.—How now? Whither bear you this?

PAINTER. Certain. Alcibiades reports it; Phrynia and Timandra had gold of him. He likewise enriched poor straggling soldiers with great quantity. ’Tis said he gave unto his stew...

BOLINGBROKE. Nay, rather, every tedious stride I make Will but remember me what a deal of world I wander from the jewels that I love. Must I not serve a long apprenticehood To f...

DUKE. Why, here begins his morning story right: These two Antipholus’, these two so like, And these two Dromios, one in semblance, Besides her urging of her wreck at sea. These...

PRINCESS. “Fair” I give you back again, and “welcome” I have not yet. The roof of this court is too high to be yours, and welcome to the wide fields too base to be mine.

CHARMIAN. Good now, some excellent fortune! Let me be married to three kings in a forenoon and widow them all. Let me have a child at fifty, to whom Herod of Jewry may do homage...

CORNELIUS. Your daughter, whom she bore in hand to love With such integrity, she did confess Was as a scorpion to her sight; whose life, But that her flight prevented it, she ha...

EXETER. Well didst thou, Richard, to suppress thy voice; For, had the passions of thy heart burst out, I fear we should have seen decipher’d there More rancorous spite, more fur...

SUFFOLK. Why, that’s well said. Go, get you to my house; I will reward you for this venturous deed. The King and all the peers are here at hand. Have you laid fair the bed? Is a...

CAESAR. Welcome hither. Your letters did withhold our breaking forth Till we perceived both how you were wrong led And we in negligent danger. Cheer your heart. Be you not troub...

HELICANUS. No, Escanes, know this of me, Antiochus from incest lived not free: For which the most high gods not minding longer To withhold the vengeance that they had in store D...

TROILUS. O Cressida! but that the busy day, Wak’d by the lark, hath rous’d the ribald crows, And dreaming night will hide our joys no longer, I would not from thee.

GLOUCESTER. [_Reads_.] Imprimis, _it is agreed between the French king Charles and William de la Pole, Marquess of Suffolk, ambassador for Henry, King of England, that the said...

KING LEWIS. Why stay we now? These soldiers shall be levied, And thou, Lord Bourbon, our High Admiral, Shall waft them over with our royal fleet. I long till Edward fall by war’...

MENENIUS. You know neither me, yourselves, nor anything. You are ambitious for poor knaves’ caps and legs. You wear out a good wholesome forenoon in hearing a cause between an o...

CHORUS. O for a Muse of fire, that would ascend The brightest heaven of invention, A kingdom for a stage, princes to act, And monarchs to behold the swelling scene! Then should...

CALIBAN. I’ll show thee the best springs; I’ll pluck thee berries; I’ll fish for thee, and get thee wood enough. A plague upon the tyrant that I serve! I’ll bear him no more sti...

BELARIUS. Prithee, fair youth, Think us no churls, nor measure our good minds By this rude place we live in. Well encounter’d! ’Tis almost night; you shall have better cheer Ere...

PROLOGUE Gentles, perchance you wonder at this show; But wonder on, till truth make all things plain. This man is Pyramus, if you would know; This beauteous lady Thisbe is certa...

RODERIGO. Sir, I will answer anything. But I beseech you, If ’t be your pleasure, and most wise consent, (As partly I find it is) that your fair daughter, At this odd-even and d...

PROTEUS. You have prevailed, my lord. If I can do it By aught that I can speak in his dispraise, She shall not long continue love to him. But say this weed her love from Valenti...

MONTGOMERY. What talk you of debating? In few words, If you’ll not here proclaim yourself our king, I’ll leave you to your fortune and be gone To keep them back that come to suc...

FLAVIUS. [_Aside_.] What will this come to? He commands us to provide, and give great gifts, And all out of an empty coffer; Nor will he know his purse or yield me this: To show...

“Bid me discourse, I will enchant thine ear, Or like a fairy, trip upon the green, Or like a nymph, with long dishevell’d hair, Dance on the sands, and yet no footing seen. 148...

“Let him have time to tear his curled hair, Let him have time against himself to rave, Let him have time of Time’s help to despair, Let him have time to live a loathed slave, Le...

ULYSSES. The great Achilles, whom opinion crowns The sinew and the forehand of our host, Having his ear full of his airy fame, Grows dainty of his worth, and in his tent Lies mo...

LEAR. I’ll tell thee. [_To Goneril._] Life and death! I am asham’d That thou hast power to shake my manhood thus; That these hot tears, which break from me perforce, Should make...

The raven himself is hoarse That croaks the fatal entrance of Duncan Under my battlements. Come, you spirits That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here, And fill me, from the c...

PISTOL. _Solus_, egregious dog! O viper vile! The _solus_ in thy most mervailous face; The _solus_ in thy teeth, and in thy throat, And in thy hateful lungs, yea, in thy maw, pe...

ANTONY. And thou art honest too. I wish I could be made so many men, And all of you clapped up together in An Antony, that I might do you service So good as you have done.

VALERIA. O’ my word, the father’s son! I’ll swear ’tis a very pretty boy. O’ my troth, I looked upon him o’ Wednesday half an hour together. H’as such a confirmed countenance. I...

DUCHESS. Who meets us here? My niece Plantagenet Led in the hand of her kind aunt of Gloucester? Now, for my life, she’s wandering to the Tower, On pure heart’s love, to greet t...

TITUS. Patient yourself, madam, and pardon me. These are their brethren whom your Goths beheld Alive and dead, and for their brethren slain Religiously they ask a sacrifice. To...

QUEEN ELIZABETH. I have no more sons of the royal blood For thee to slaughter. For my daughters, Richard, They shall be praying nuns, not weeping queens, And therefore level not...

LUCIANA. Why, headstrong liberty is lash’d with woe. There’s nothing situate under heaven’s eye But hath his bound in earth, in sea, in sky. The beasts, the fishes, and the wing...

ACT III Scene I. Athens. A room in Lucullus’ house Scene II. A public place Scene III. The same. A room in Sempronius’ house Scene IV. A hall in Timon’s house Scene V. The same....

EDGAR. This is the foul fiend Flibbertigibbet: he begins at curfew, and walks till the first cock; he gives the web and the pin, squints the eye, and makes the harelip; mildews...

THERSITES. God-a-mercy, that thou wilt believe me; but a plague break thy neck for frighting me! What’s become of the wenching rogues? I think they have swallowed one another. I...

MARINA. Do anything but this thou doest. Empty Old receptacles, or common shores, of filth; Serve by indenture to the common hangman: Any of these ways are yet better than this;...

EDMUND. Know of the Duke if his last purpose hold, Or whether since he is advis’d by aught To change the course, he’s full of alteration And self-reproving, bring his constant p...

LAERTES. I am satisfied in nature, Whose motive in this case should stir me most To my revenge. But in my terms of honour I stand aloof, and will no reconcilement Till by some e...

The proudest peer in the realm shall not wear a head on his shoulders unless he pay me tribute; there shall not a maid be married but she shall pay to me her maidenhead ere they...

BOYET. They will, they will, God knows, And leap for joy, though they are lame with blows. Therefore, change favours and, when they repair, Blow like sweet roses in this summer...

GONERIL. The best and soundest of his time hath been but rash; then must we look from his age to receive not alone the imperfections of long-engrafted condition, but therewithal...

KING HENRY. No; ’tis hereafter to know, but now to promise. Do but now promise, Kate, you will endeavour for your French part of such a boy; and for my English moiety, take the...

COUNTESS. The plot is laid. If all things fall out right, I shall as famous be by this exploit As Scythian Tomyris by Cyrus’ death. Great is the rumour of this dreadful knight,...

HECTOR. Paris and Troilus, you have both said well; And on the cause and question now in hand Have gloz’d, but superficially; not much Unlike young men, whom Aristotle thought U...

SEMPRONIUS. How? Have they denied him? Has Ventidius and Lucullus denied him And does he send to me? Three? Humh! It shows but little love or judgment in him. Must I be his last...

O fairest beauty, do not fear nor fly! For I will touch thee but with reverent hands, I kiss these fingers for eternal peace, And lay them gently on thy tender side. Who art tho...

TITUS. The hunt is up, the morn is bright and grey, The fields are fragrant, and the woods are green. Uncouple here, and let us make a bay, And wake the emperor and his lovely b...

In him the painter laboured with his skill To hide deceit and give the harmless show An humble gait, calm looks, eyes wailing still, A brow unbent that seemed to welcome woe, Ch...

TITUS. I am not mad; I know thee well enough. Witness this wretched stump, witness these crimson lines; Witness these trenches made by grief and care; Witness the tiring day and...

HORNER. Alas, my lord, hang me if ever I spake the words. My accuser is my prentice; and when I did correct him for his fault the other day, he did vow upon his knees he would b...

BIONDELLO. I cannot tell, except they are busied about a counterfeit assurance. Take your assurance of her, _cum privilegio ad imprimendum solum_; to the church! take the priest...

BRUTUS. Good gentlemen, look fresh and merrily; Let not our looks put on our purposes, But bear it as our Roman actors do, With untired spirits and formal constancy. And so, goo...

KING HENRY. Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more, Or close the wall up with our English dead. In peace there’s nothing so becomes a man As modest stillness and hum...

PRINCESS. A time, methinks, too short To make a world-without-end bargain in. No, no, my lord, your Grace is perjured much, Full of dear guiltiness; and therefore this: If for m...

Here come more voices. Your voices! For your voices I have fought; Watched for your voices; for your voices bear Of wounds two dozen odd. Battles thrice six I have seen and hear...

PUCELLE. I am prepared. Here is my keen-edg’d sword, Deck’d with five flower-de-luces on each side, The which at Touraine, in Saint Katharine’s churchyard, Out of a great deal o...

LEONTES. Though I am satisfied, and need no more Than what I know, yet shall the oracle Give rest to the minds of others, such as he Whose ignorant credulity will not Come up to...

KING RICHARD. So, I am satisfied. Give me a bowl of wine. I have not that alacrity of spirit Nor cheer of mind that I was wont to have. Set it down. Is ink and paper ready?

KING HENRY. Stoop then and set your knee against my foot; And in reguerdon of that duty done I girt thee with the valiant sword of York. Rise, Richard, like a true Plantagenet,...

Imagine her as one in dead of night From forth dull sleep by dreadful fancy waking, That thinks she hath beheld some ghastly sprite, Whose grim aspect sets every joint a shaking...

ACHILLES. Tell me, you heavens, in which part of his body Shall I destroy him? Whether there, or there, or there? That I may give the local wound a name, And make distinct the v...

COSTARD. By my soul, a swain, a most simple clown! Lord, Lord, how the ladies and I have put him down! O’ my troth, most sweet jests, most incony vulgar wit, When it comes so sm...

BEROWNE. O, ’tis more than need. Have at you, then, affection’s men-at-arms. Consider what you first did swear unto: To fast, to study, and to see no woman— Flat treason ’gainst...

ENOBARBUS. I think so too. But you shall find the band that seems to tie their friendship together will be the very strangler of their amity. Octavia is of a holy, cold, and sti...

The love I dedicate to your Lordship is without end; whereof this pamphlet, without beginning, is but a superfluous moiety. The warrant I have of your honourable disposition, no...

CHIEF JUSTICE. I know he doth not, and do arm myself To welcome the condition of the time, Which cannot look more hideously upon me Than I have drawn it in my fantasy.

OBERON. Thou seest these lovers seek a place to fight. Hie therefore, Robin, overcast the night; The starry welkin cover thou anon With drooping fog, as black as Acheron, And le...

“Oh let him keep his loathsome cabin still, 637 Beauty hath naught to do with such foul fiends: Come not within his danger by thy will; They that thrive well, take counsel of th...

PRINCE. Yea, and you knew me, as you did when you ran away by Gad’s Hill. You knew I was at your back, and spoke it on purpose to try my patience.

FALSTAFF. Fare you well, gentle gentlemen. [_Exeunt Justices_.] On, Bardolph, lead the men away. [_Exeunt Bardolph, recruits, &c._] As I return, I will fetch off these justices....

QUEEN KATHERINE. I am much too venturous In tempting of your patience, but am boldened Under your promised pardon. The subjects’ grief Comes through commissions, which compels f...

TROILUS. O Pandarus! I tell thee, Pandarus, When I do tell thee there my hopes lie drown’d, Reply not in how many fathoms deep They lie indrench’d. I tell thee I am mad In Cress...

Two glasses where herself herself beheld 1129 A thousand times, and now no more reflect; Their virtue lost, wherein they late excell’d, And every beauty robb’d of his effect. 11...