Quotes to inspire and reflect

’Tis not enough to help the feeble up, But to support him after.

And my poor fool is hang’d! No, no, no life! Why should a dog, a horse, a rat, have life, And thou no breath at all? Thou’lt come no more, Never, never, never, never, never! Pray you, undo this button.

Vex not his ghost: O! let him pass; he hates him That would upon the rack of this tough world Stretch him out longer.

Her voice was ever soft, Gentle and low, an excellent thing in woman.

Howl, howl, howl, howl! O! you are men of stones: Had I your tongues and eyes, I’d use them so That heaven’s vaults should crack. She’s gone forever.

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

The wheel is come full circle.

Upon such sacrifices, my Cordelia, The gods themselves throw incense.

Men must endure Their going hence, even as their coming hither: Ripeness is all.

Pray you now, forget and forgive.

I am a very foolish fond old man, Fourscore and upward, not an hour more or less; And, to deal plainly, I fear I am not in my perfect mind.

Thou art a soul in bliss; but I am bound Upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears Do scald like molten lead.

Mine enemy’s dog, Though he had bit me, should have stood that night Against my fire.

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

Then, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill, kill!

Through tatter’d clothes small vices do appear; Robes and furr’d gowns hide all. Plate sin with gold, And the strong lance of justice hurtless breaks; Arm it in rags, a pigmy’s straw does pierce it.

Get thee glass eyes; And, like a scurvy politician, seem To see the things thou dost not.

The wren goes to ’t, and the small gilded fly Does lecher in my sight. Let copulation thrive.

Ay, every inch a king.

How fearful And dizzy ’tis to cast one’s eyes so low! The crows and choughs that wing the midway air Show scarce so gross as beetles; halfway down Hangs one that gathers samphire, dreadful trade! Methinks he seems no bigger than his head. The fishermen that walk upon the beach Appear like mice, and yond tall anchoring bark Diminish’d to her cock, her cock a buoy Almost too small for sight. The murmuring surge, That on the unnumber’d idle pebbles chafes, Cannot be heard so high.

Our foster-nurse of nature is repose.

It is the stars, The stars above us, govern our conditions.

Tigers, not daughters.

Wisdom and goodness to the vile seem vile; Filths savor but themselves.

She that herself will sliver and disbranch From her material sap, perforce must wither And come to deadly use.

You are not worth the dust which the rude wind Blows in your face.

As flies to wanton boys, are we to the gods; They kill us for their sport.

The lowest and most dejected thing of fortune.

The worst is not, So long as we can say, “This is the worst.”

Out, vile jelly!

I am tied to the stake, and I must stand the course.

The little dogs and all, Tray, Blanch, and Sweetheart, see, they bark at me.

Child Rowland to the dark tower came, 47 His word was still, Fie, foh, and fum, I smell the blood of a British man.

Poor Tom’s a-cold.

The prince of darkness is a gentleman. 46

Pillicock sat on Pillicock-hill: Halloo, halloo, loo, loo!

But mice and rats and such small deer Have been Tom’s food for seven long year.

Poor naked wretches, wheresoe’er you are, That bide the pelting of this pitiless storm, How shall your houseless heads and unfed sides, Your loop’d and window’d raggedness, defend you From seasons such as these? O! I have ta’en Too little care of this. Take physic, pomp; Expose thyself to feel what wretches feel, That thou mayst shake the superflux to them, And show the heavens more just.

O! that way madness lies; let me shun that.

The art of our necessities is strange, That can make vile things precious.

I am a man More sinn’d against than sinning.

A poor, infirm, weak, and despis’d old man.

I will be the pattern of all patience.

I tax not you, you elements, with unkindness.

Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks! rage! blow! You cataracts and hurricanoes, spout Till you have drench’d our steeples, drown’d the cocks! You sulphurous and thought-executing fires, Vaunt-couriers to oak-cleaving thunderbolts, Singe my white head! And thou, all-shaking thunder, Strike flat the thick rotundity o’ the world! Crack nature’s molds, all germens spill at once That make ingrateful man!

Let not women’s weapons, waterdrops, Stain my man’s cheeks!

I have full cause of weeping, but this heart Shall break into a hundred thousand flaws Or ere I’ll weep. O fool! I shall go mad.

Necessity’s sharp pinch!