William Shakespeare Quotes on Man (261 Quotes)


    O powerful love,that in some respects makes a beast a man,in some other, a man a beast.



    He that plays the king shall be welcome- his Majesty shall
    have tribute of me; the adventurous knight shall use his foil and
    target; the lover shall not sigh gratis; the humorous man shall
    end his part in peace; the clown shall make those laugh whose
    lungs are tickle o' th' sere; and the lady shall say her mind
    freely, or the blank verse shall halt fort.



    I charge
    you, O women, for the love you bear to men, to like as much of
    this play as please you; and I charge you, O men, for the love
    you bear to women- as I perceive by your simp'ring none of you
    hates them- that between you and the women the play may please.

    I have no brother, I am like no brother;
    And this word 'love,' which greybeards call divine,
    Be resident in men like one another,
    And not in me!

    This is the excellent foppery of the world that when we are sick in fortune -- often the surfeits of our own behavior -- we make guilty of our disasters the sun, the moon, and stars, as if we were villains on necessity, fools by heavenly compulsion, knaves, thieves, and treachers by spherical predominance, drunkards, liars, and adulterers by an enforced obedience of planetary influence. An admirable evasion of whoremaster man, to lay his goatish disposition on the charge of a star.

    To thine own self be true, and it must follow, as the night the day, thou canst not then be false to any man.


    Sing no more ditties, sing no mo
    Of dumps so dull and heavy;
    The fraud of men was ever so,
    Since summer first was leavy.

    For bounty, that makes gods, does still mar men. My dearest lord, bless'd, to be most accursed, Rich, only to be wretched, thy great fortunes; Are made thy chief afflictions.


    There is a devil
    haunts thee in the likeness of an old fat man; a tun of man is
    thy companion.

    I think the King is but a man as I am the violet smells to him as it doth to me.

    If any man challenge this, he
    is a friend to Alencon and an enemy to our person; if thou
    encounter any such, apprehend him, an thou dost me love.

    The Duke of Exeter is as magnanimous as Agamemnon; and a
    man that I love and honour with my soul, and my heart, and my
    duty, and my live, and my living, and my uttermost power.




    I say unto you, what he hath done famously he did it
    to that end; though soft-conscienc'd men can be content to say it
    was for his country, he did it to please his mother and to be
    partly proud, which he is, even to the altitude of his virtue.


    And, to add greater honours to his age
    Than man could give him, he died fearing God.


    Thou common friend, that's without faith or love-
    For such is a friend now; treacherous man,
    Thou hast beguil'd my hopes; nought but mine eye
    Could have persuaded me.

    Of all the wonders that I yet have heard,It seems to me most strange that men should fearSeeing that death, a necessary end,Will come when it will come.

    Oh, thou hast a damnable iteration, and art indeed able to corrupt a saint. Thou hast done much harm upon me Hal, God forgive thee for it. Before I knew thee Hal, I knew nothing, and now am I, if a man should speak truly, little better than one of the wicked.

    When holy and devout religious men Are at their beads, 'tis hard to draw them thence So sweet is zealous contemplation.

    Faith, sir, has led the drum before the English
    tragedians-to belie him I will not-and more of his soldier-ship
    I know not, except in that country he had the honour to be the
    officer at a place there called Mile-end to instruct for the
    doubling of files-I would do the man what honour I can-but of
    this I am not certain.

    To wilful men, the injuries that they themselves procure must be their schoolmasters.

    Though it pass your patience and mine to
    endure her loud alarums, why, man, there be good fellows in the
    world, an a man could light on them, would take her with all
    faults, and money enough.

    Men judge by the complexion of the sky The state and inclination of the day.

    If we are marked to die, we are enough to do our country loss; and if to live, the fewer men, the greater share of honor.

    Where is your ancient courage You were used to say extremities was the trier of spirits That common chances common men could bear That when the sea was calm all boats alike showed mastership in floating.

    O, now doth Death line his dead chaps with steel;
    The swords of soldiers are his teeth, his fangs;
    And now he feasts, mousing the flesh of men,
    In undetermin'd differences of kings.

    If you do love old men, if your sweet sway
    Allow obedience- if yourselves are old,
    Make it your cause!

    Good faith, this same young sober-blooded boy doth not
    love me; nor a man cannot make him laugh- but that's no marvel;
    he drinks no wine.

    Think'st thou, Hortensio, though her father
    be very rich, any man is so very a fool to be married to hell?

    What a piece of work is a man, how noble in reason, how infinite in faculties, in form and moving how express and admirable, in action how like an angel, in apprehension how like a god.

    So holy and so perfect is my love,
    And I in such a poverty of grace,
    That I shall think it a most plenteous crop
    To glean the broken ears after the man
    That the main harvest reaps; loose now and then
    A scatt'red smile, and that I'll live upon.

    Anointed let me be with deadly venom,
    And die ere men can say 'God save the Queen!

    Why, man, he doth bestride the narrow world Like a Colossus and we petty men Walk under his huge legs.

    O, there be players that I
    have seen play, and heard others praise, and that highly (not to
    speak it profanely), that, neither having the accent of
    Christians, nor the gait of Christian, pagan, nor man, have so
    strutted and bellowed that I have thought some of Nature's
    journeymen had made men, and not made them well, they imitated
    humanity so abominably.

    They say the best men are molded out of faults and, for the most, become much more the better for being a little bad.




    Good friend, for Jesus sake forbear To dig the dust enclosed here. Blest be the man that spares these stones, And cursed be he that moves my bones.


    We men may say more, swear more, but indeed
    Our shows are more than will; for still we prove
    Much in our vows, but little in our love.


    More William Shakespeare Quotations (Based on Topics)


    Love - Man - Mind - Kings & Queens - World - Time - Life - God - Friendship - Belief & Faith - Death & Dying - Heaven - War & Peace - Fairness - Fear - Speaking - Fool - Night - Soul - View All William Shakespeare Quotations

    More William Shakespeare Quotations (By Book Titles)


    - A Midsummer Night's Dream
    - As You Like It
    - Julius Caesar
    - King Lear
    - Much Ado About Nothing
    - Othello
    - The Merchant of Venice
    - The Taming of the Shrew
    - Twelfth Night

    Related Authors


    William Shakespeare - Oscar Wilde - George Bernard Shaw - Lady Gregory - John Fletcher - Jean Racine - Hannah Cowley - George Colman - Anton Chekhov - Alexandre Dumas


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