William Shakespeare (1564 – 1616) was an English poet, playwright and actor, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world’s greatest dramatist and poet. He is often called England’s national poet and the “Bard of Avon.” His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright. The best-selling fiction writer of all time, his most well-known works include Romeo and Juliet, Hamlet, Macbeth and Othello.
Quotes by William Shakespeare…
We, ignorant of ourselves, beg often our own harms, which the wise powers deny us for our own good; so find we profit by losing of our prayers.
It is required,
You do awake your faith.
Then all stand still.
On those that think it is unlawful business I am about,
let them depart.
Of all knowledge the wise and good seek most to know themselves.
Love thyself last.
Who seeks, and will not take when once ’tis offered, shall never find it more.
The quality of mercy is not strain’d,
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.
These few precepts in thy memory
See thou character. Give thy thoughts no tongue,
Nor any unproportioned thought his act.
Be thou familiar, but by no means vulgar.
Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried,
Grapple them to thy soul with hoops of steel;
But do not dull thy palm with entertainment
Of each new-hatch’d, unfledged comrade. Beware
Of entrance to a quarrel, but being in,
Bear’t that the opposed may beware of thee.
Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice;
Take each man’s censure, but reserve thy judgment.
Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,
But not express’d in fancy; rich, not gaudy;
For the apparel oft proclaims the man,
And they in France of the best rank and station
Are of a most select and generous sheaf in that.
Neither a borrower nor a lender be;
For loan oft loses both itself and friend,
And borrowing dulls the edge of husbandry.
This above all: to thine ownself be true,
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man.
And this, our life exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything.
Do as the heavens have done, forget your evil;
with them forgive yourself.