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Fool. Have more than thou showest,
Speak less than thou knowest,

Lend less than thou owest,
Ride more than thou goest,

Learn more than thou trowest,

Set less than thou throwest.-Act 1, Sc. 4.

Lear. Ingratitude, thou marble-hearted fiend,
More hideous when thou show'st thee in a child,
Than the sea-monster !-Act 1, Sc. 4.

Lear. How sharper than a serpent's tooth it is
To have a thankless child!—Act 1, Sc. 4.

Albany. Striving to better, oft we mar what's well.

Act 1, Sc. 4.

King. Dear daughter, I confess that I am old;
Age is unnecessary; on my knees I beg
That you'll vouchsafe me raiment, bed, and food.

Act 2, Sc. 4.

King. You see me here, you gods, a poor old man,
As full of grief as age; wretched in both.

Regan.

O, sir, to wilful men,

The injuries that they themselves procure

Must be their schoolmasters.-Act 2, Sc. 4.

Act 2, Sc. 4.

Lear. 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,

Lear.

Singe my white head! And thou, all-shaking thunder,
Smite flat the thick rotundity of the world!

I am a man

Act 3, Sc. 2.

More sinn'd against, than sinning.-Act 3, Sc. 2.

Fool. I'll speak a prophecy ere I go :

When priests are more in word than matter;
When brewers mar their malt with water;
When nobles are their tailors' tutors;
No heretics burn'd, but wenches' suitors;
When every case in law is right;
No squire in debt, nor no poor knight;
When slanders do not live in tongues;
Nor cutpurses come not to throngs ;
When usurers tell their gold i' the field;
Then shall the realm of Albion

Come to great confusion :

Then comes the time, who lives to see 't,

That going shall be us'd with feet.-Act 3, Sc. 2.

Edg. Child Rowland to the dark tower came,
His word was still,- Fie, foh, and fum,

I smell the blood of a British man.*-Act 3, Sc. 4.

Edg. When we our betters see bearing our woes,
We scarcely think our miseries our foes.
Who alone suffers suffers most i' the mind,
Leaving free things and happy shows behind :
But then the mind much sufferance doth o'erskip,
When grief hath mates, and bearing fellowship.

Act 3, Sc. 6.

*The origin of these lines, familiar to every child in the nursery story of Jack the Giant-killer, are to be found in an old romance which was well known in Shakespeare's time.

Albany. Wisdom and goodness to the vile seem vile :
Filths savour but themselves.-Act 4, Sc. 2.

Edg. Come on, sir; here's the place: stand still. 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: half way 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. I'll look no more;
Lest my · brain turn, and the deficient sight
Topple down headlong.—Act 4, Sc. 6.

Gloucester. The trick of that voice I do well remember;
Is 't not the king?

Lear.

Lear.

Ay, every inch a king.-Act 4, Sc. 6.

Give me an ounce of civet, good apothecary, to

sweeten my imagination.

Act 4, Sc. 6.

Lear. Thou hast seen a farmer's dog bark at a beggar?

Glou. Ay, sir.

Lear. And the creature run from the cur?

There thou

mightst behold the great image of authority: a dog's obeyed in office.-Act 4, Sc. 6.

Lear. 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.

Act 4, Sc. 6.

Lear. When we are born, we cry, that we are come
To this great stage of fools.-Act 4, Sc. 6.

Lear. It were a delicate stratagem, to shoe

A troop of horse with felt.-Act 4, Sc. 6.

Edg. The gods are just, and of our pleasant vices
Make instruments to plague us.—Act 5, Sc. 3.

Lear.

Her voice was ever soft,

Act 5, Sc. 3.

Gentle and low, an excellent thing in woman.

Iago.

OTHELLO.

'Tis the curse of service,

Preferment goes by letter and affection,
And not by old gradation, where each second
Stood heir to the first.-Act 1, Sc. I.

Iago. We cannot all be masters, nor all masters
Cannot be truly follow'd. You shall mark
Many a duteous and knee-crooking knave,
That, doting on his own obsequious bondage,
Wears out his time, much like his master's ass,
For nought but provender, and when he's old cashier'd :
Whip me such honest knaves. Others there are
Who, trimm'd in forms and visages of duty,
Keep yet their hearts attending on themselves,
And, throwing but shows of service on their lords,
Do well thrive by them, and when they have lined
their coats,

Do themselves homage :-Act I, Sc. I.

Oth. Most potent, grave, and reverend signiors,
My very noble and approv'd good masters,

That I have ta'en away this old man's daughter,
It is most true; true, I have married her:

The very head and front of my offending

Hath this extent, no more. Rude am I in my speech,
And little bless'd with the soft phrase of peace :
For since these arms of mine had seven years' pith,
Till now some nine moons wasted, they have us'd
Their dearest action in the tented field,

And little of this great world can I speak,

More than pertains to feats of broil and battle,

And therefore little shall I grace my cause

In speaking for myself. Yet, by your gracious patience,

I will a round unvarnish'd tale deliver

Of my whole course of love; what drugs, what charms,

What conjuration and what mighty magic,

For such proceeding I am charged withal,
I won his daughter.

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Her father lov'd me; oft invited me;

Still question'd me the story of my life,
From year to year, the battles, sieges, fortunes,
That I have pass'd.

I ran it through, ev'n from my boyish days,
To the very moment that he bade me tell it;
Wherein I spake of most disastrous chances,

Of moving accidents by flood and field,

Of hair-breadth scapes i' the imminent deadly breach, Of being taken by the insolent foe

And sold to slavery, of my redemption thence

And portance in my travels' history:

Wherein of antres vast and deserts idle,

Rough quarries, rocks and hills whose heads touch heaven,

It was my hint to speak,--such was the process;

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