William Shakespeare

Honour pricks me on. Yea, but how if honour prick me off when I come on,—how then? Can honour set read more

Honour pricks me on. Yea, but how if honour prick me off when I come on,—how then? Can honour set to a leg? no: or an arm? no: or take away the grief of a wound? no. Honour hath no skill in surgery, then? no. What is honour? a word. What is in that word honour; what is that honour? air. A trim reckoning! Who hath it? he that died o' Wednesday. Doth he feel it? no. Doth he hear it? no. 'T is insensible, then? yea, to the dead. But will it not live with the living? no. Why? detraction will not suffer it. Therefore I 'll none of it. Honour is a mere scutcheon. And so ends my catechism. -King Henry IV. Part I. Act v. Sc. 1.

Bleed, bleed, poor Country!
Great tyranny, lay thou thy basis sure,
For goodness dare not check thee; read more

Bleed, bleed, poor Country!
Great tyranny, lay thou thy basis sure,
For goodness dare not check thee; wear thou thy wrongs,
The title is affeered!

He is the half part of a blessed man, Left to be finished by such as she; And she a read more

He is the half part of a blessed man, Left to be finished by such as she; And she a fair divided excellence, Whose fulness of perfection lies in him. -King John. Act ii. Sc. 1.

If I shall be condemned
Upon surmises, all proofs sleeping else
But what your jealousies awake, I read more

If I shall be condemned
Upon surmises, all proofs sleeping else
But what your jealousies awake, I tell you
'Tis rigor and not law.

Come unto these yellow sands, And then take hands: Courtsied when you have, and kiss'd The wild waves whist. -The read more

Come unto these yellow sands, And then take hands: Courtsied when you have, and kiss'd The wild waves whist. -The Tempest. Act i. Sc. 2.