William Shakespeare Fear Quotations

In time we hate that which we often fear.

Things done well and with a care, exempt themselves from fear.

To fear the worst oft cures the worse.

Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind; the thief doth fear each bush an officer.

As I love the name of honour more than I fear death.

I have almost forgotten the taste of fears: The time has been, my senses would have cool’d to hear a night-shriek; and my fell of hair would at a dismal treatise rouse and stir as life were in’t: I have supt full with horrors; Direness, familiar to my slaughterous thoughts, cannot once start me.

When daisies pied and violets blue And lady-smocks all silver-white And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue Do paint the meadows with delight, The cuckoo then, on every tree, Mocks married men; for thus sings he, Cuckoo; Cuckoo, cuckoo; O, word of fear, Unpleasing to a married ear.

ROSS You must have patience, madam. LADY MACDUFF He had none: His flight was madness: when our actions do not, Our fears do make us traitors.

. . . yet do I fear thy nature; It is too full o' the milk of human kindness To catch the nearest way: thou wouldst be great; Art not without ambition, but without The illness should attend it: what thou wouldst highly, That wouldst thou holily; wouldst not play false, And yet wouldst wrongly win:

Gives not the hawthorn bush a sweeter shade To shepherds, looking on their silly sheep, Than doth a rich embroider'd canopy To kings that fear their subjects treachery?

The fear's as bad as falling.

To saucy doubts and fears.

To be furious, is to be frighted out of fear.

Thy best of rest is sleep, And that thou oft provok'st; yet grossly fear'st Thy death, which is no more.

O all you host of heaven! O earth! What else? And shall I couple Hell?

Who knows himself a braggart,Let him fear this, for it will come to passthat every braggart shall be found an ass.

If men could be contented to be what they are, there were no fear in marriage.

Extreme fear can neither fight nor fly.

It is a basilisk unto mine eye, Kills me to look on't.

Truly the souls of men are full of dread: Ye cannot reason almost with a man That looks not heavily and full of fear.

What wouldst thou do, old man? Think'st thou that duty shall have dread to speak When power to flattery bows?

I could a tale unfold whose lightest word Would harrow up thy soul, freeze thy young blood, Make thy two eyes like stars start from their spheres, Thy knotted and combined locks to part, And each particular hair to stand on end Like quills upon the fretful porpentine. But this eternal blazon must not be To ears of flesh and blood. List, list, O list!

Be just, and fear not.

Of all base passions, fear is the most accursed.

When you fear a foe, fear crushes your strength; and this weakness gives strength to your opponents.

Be just, and fear not. Let all the ends thou aim'st at be thy country's, Thy God's and truth's.

To fear the foe, since fear oppresseth strength, gives in your weakness strength unto your foe.

Hang those that talk of fear.

Nothing routs us but the villainy of our fears.

But let the frame of things disjoint, both the worlds suffer, Ere we will eat our meal in fear, and sleep In the affliction of these terrible dreams That shake us nightly.

To fear the foe, since fear oppresseth strength, Gives, in your weakness, strength unto your foe, And so your follies fight against yourself. Fear, and be slain--so worse can come to fight; And fight and die is death destroying death, Where fearing dying pays death servile breath.

What need I fear of thee? But yet I'll make assurance double sure, and take a bond of fate: thou shalt not live; That I may tell pale-hearted fear it lies, And sleep in spite of thunder

Fear no more the heat o the sun, nor the furious winter's rages. Thou thy worldly task hast done, home art gone and taken thy wages.

The guilt being great, the fear doth still exceed; And extreme fear can neither fight nor fly, But coward-like with trembling terror die