William Shakespeare Quotes on Praise (27 Quotes)

O, how I faint when I of you do write,
Knowing a better spirit doth use your name,
And in the praise thereof spends all his might
To make me tongue-tied speaking of your fame.

Pride is his own glass,
his own trumpet, his own chronicle; and whatever praises itself
but in the deed devours the deed in the praise.

Your brother- no, no brother; yet the son-
Yet not the son; I will not call him son
Of him I was about to call his father-
Hath heard your praises; and this night he means
To burn the lodging where you use to lie,
And you within it.

One good deed dying tongueless Slaughters a thousand waiting upon that. Our praises are our wages.

All, with one consent, praise newborn gawds (sic), though they are made and molded of things past

My tongue-tied Muse in manners holds her still,
While comments of your praise, richly compiled,
Reserve their character with golden quill,
And precious phrase by all the Muses filed.

Because he needs no praise, wilt thou be dumb?

Words, vows, gifts, tears, and love's full sacrifice,
He offers in another's enterprise;
But more in Troilus thousand-fold I see
Than in the glass of Pandar's praise may be,
Yet hold I off.

'Gainst death and all-oblivious enmity
Shall you pace forth; your praise shall still find room,
Even in the eyes of all posterity
That wear this world out to the ending doom.

Thou hast passed by the ambush of young days,
Either not assailed, or victor being charged;
Yet this thy praise cannot be so thy praise,
To tie up envy, evermore enlarged.

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.

Praise us as we are tasted, allow us as we prove.

You to your beauteous blessings add a curse,
Being fond on praise, which makes your praises worse.

Then being asked, where all thy beauty lies,
Where all the treasure of thy lusty days,
To say within thine own deep sunken eyes,
Were an all-eating shame, and thriftless praise.

If my slight Muse do please these curious days,
The pain be mine, but thine shall be the praise.

Manhood is melted into courtesies, valour into compliment, and men are only turned into tongue, and trim ones, too.

For we, which now behold these present days,
Have eyes to wonder, but lack tongues to praise.

There lives more life in one of your fair eyes,
Than both your poets can in praise devise.

Well then, if ever I thank any man, I'll thank you; but
that they call compliment is like th' encounter of two dog-apes;
and when a man thanks me heartily, methinks have given him a
penny, and he renders me the beggarly thanks.

I ne'er made my will yet, I thank heaven; I am not
such a sickly creature, I give heaven praise.

Hearing you praised, I say "'Tis so, 'tis true,"
And to the most of praise add something more;
But that is in my thought, whose love to you,
Though words come hindmost, holds his rank before.

So all their praises are but prophecies
Of this our time, all you prefiguring;
And, for they looked but with divining eyes,
They had not skill enough your worth to sing.

O, sure I am the wits of former days
To subjects worse have given admiring praise.

My lords, at once: the care you have of us,
To mow down thorns that would annoy our foot,
Is worthy praise; but shall I speak my conscience?

'Tis thee, myself, that for my self I praise,
Painting my age with beauty of thy days.

For when my outward action doth demonstrate; The native act and figure of my heart; In compliment extern, 'tis not long after; But I will wear my heart upon my sleeve; For daws to peck at I am not what I am.

That tongue that tells the story of thy days,
Making lascivious comments on thy sport,
Cannot dispraise, but in a kind of praise,
Naming thy name, blesses an ill report.