William Shakespeare Memorable Quotations

We know what we are, but know not what we may be.

Double, double, toil and trouble; Fire burn, and cauldron bubble!

I must be cruel, only to be kind.

When we are born we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools.

He is winding the watch of his wit; by and by it will strike.

Be great in act, as you have been in thought.

False face must hide what the false heart doth know.

Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall.

I wasted time, and now doth time waste me.

He that is giddy thinks the world turns round.

The devil can cite Scripture for his purpose.

The attempt and not the deed confounds us.

Suspicion always haunts the guilty mind.

He who has injured thee was either stronger or weaker than thee. If weaker, spare him; if stronger, spare thyself.

That man that hath a tongue, I say is no man, if with his tongue he cannot win a woman.

Conversation should be pleasant without scurrility, witty without affectation, free without indecency, learned without conceitedness, novel without falsehood.

Nothing emboldens sin so much as mercy.

Praising what is lost makes the remembrance dear

The Devil hath power To assume a pleasing shape.

Virtue and genuine graces in themselves speak what no words can utter.

You cram these words into mine ears against The stomach of my sense.

He was a man, take him for all in all, I shall not look upon his like again.

When lenity and cruelty play for a kingdom, the gentler gamester is the soonest winner

But, soft! what light through yonder window breaks? It is the east, and Juliet is the sun.

Truth is truth to the end of reckoning.

So full of artless jealousy is guilt, It spills itself in fearing to be spilt.

He that commends me to mine own content Commends me to the thing I cannot get.

The trust I have is in mine innocence, and therefore am I bold and resolute.

I thank God I am as honest as any man living that is an old man and no honester than I.

I will be correspondent to command, And do my spiriting gently.

A kind Of excellent dumb discourse.

I will make a Star-chamber matter of it.

Although the last, not least.

From this day forward until the end of the world...we in it shall be remembered...we band of brothers.

Small to greater matters must give way.

For Brutus is an honourable man; So are they all, all honourable men.

He hath eaten me out of house and home.

The law hath not been dead, though it hath slept.

Thou art all the comfort, The Gods will diet me with.

How use doth breed a habit in a man.

Is this a dagger which I see before me, The handle toward my hand? Come, let me clutch thee. I have thee not, and yet I see thee still. Art thou not, fatal vision, sensible To feeling as to sight? or art thou but A dagger of the mind, a false creation, Proceeding from the heat-oppressed brain?

How many ages hence Shall this our lofty scene be acted over In states unborn and accents yet unknown!

Thou shalt be both the plaintiff and the judge of thine own cause.

I cannot tell what the dickens his name is.

Their understanding Begins to swell and the approaching tide Will shortly fill the reasonable shores That now lie foul and muddy.

For they are yet ear-kissing arguments.

Fill all thy bones with aches.

Now would I give a thousand furlongs of sea for an acre of barren ground.

I pray thee cease thy counsel, Which falls into mine ears as profitless as water in a sieve.

I, thus neglecting worldly ends, all dedicated To closeness and the bettering of my mind.

If this were played upon a stage now, I could condemn it as an improbable fiction.

A hit, a very palpable hit.

I shall despair. There is no creature loves me; And if I die no soul will pity me: And wherefore should they, since that I myself Find in myself no pity to myself?

When he is best, he is a little worse than a man; and when he is worst, he is little better than a beast.

When griping grief the heart doth wound, and doleful dumps the mind opresses, then music, with her silver sound, with speedy help doth lend redress.

The gaudy, blabbing, and remorseful day Is crept into the bosom of the sea.

Oh, that way madness lies; let me shun that.

Some men never seem to grow old. Always active in thought, always ready to adopt new ideas, they are never chargeable with foggyism. Satisfied, yet ever dissatisfied, settled, yet ever unsettled, they always enjoy the best of what is, are the first to find the best of what will be.

Each present joy or sorrow seems the chief.

But no perfection is so absolute, That some impurity doth not pollute.

I wish you well and so I take my leave, I Pray you know me when we meet again.

Speak to me as to thy thinkings, As thou dost ruminate, and give thy worst of thoughts The worst of words.

We have some salt of our youth in us.

He that dies pays all debts.

My salad days, When I was green in judgment.

So may he rest, his faults lie gently on him!

Come not within the measure of my wrath.

Like one Who having into truth, by telling of it, Made such a sinner of his memory, To credit his own lie.

While thou livest keep a good tongue in thy head.

Thou art the Mars of malcontents.

Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments: love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds.

Thy words, I grant are bigger, for I wear not, my dagger in my mouth.

Home-keeping youth have ever homely wits.

Your hearts are mighty, your skins are whole.

I do begin to have bloody thoughts.

This England never did, nor never shall, Lie at the proud foot of a conqueror.

The gods are just, and of our pleasant vices Make instruments to plague us.

It is meant that noble minds keep ever with their likes; for who so firm that cannot be seduced.

What the great ones do, the less will prattle of

My meaning in saying he is a good man, is to have you understand me that he is sufficient.

Though inclination be as sharp as will, My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent, And, like a man to double business bound, I stand in pause where I shall first begin, And both neglect.

Merrily, merrily shall I live now, Under the blossom that hangs on the bough.

If there be no great love in the beginning, yet heaven may decrease it upon better acquaintance, when we are married and have more occasion to know one another: I hope, upon familiarity will grow more contempt.

It is a familiar beast to man, and signifies love.

Those that are good manners at the court are as ridiculous in the country, as the behavior of the country is most mockable at the court.

We do not keep the outward form of order, where there is deep disorder in the mind.

A very ancient and fish-like smell.

Farewell! thou art too dear for my possessing.

Cursed be he that moves my bones.

This is the short and the long of it.

Your face is a book, where men may read strange matters.

I pray you bear me henceforth from the noise and rumour of the field, where I may think the remnant of my thoughts in peace, and part of this body and my soul with contemplation and devout desires.

The lady doth protest too much, methinks.

See first that the design is wise and just: that ascertained, pursue it resolutely; do not for one repulse forego the purpose that you resolved to effect.

Age cannot wither her, nor custom stale Her infinite variety.

I feel within me a peace above all earthly dignities, a still and quiet conscience.

I have not slept one wink.

Strong reasons make strong actions.

I am wealthy in my friends.

Frailty, thy name is woman!