I am cut to the brains.
King Lear 4.6.188-9, LEAR TO A GENTLEMAN 2 O you kind gods!
Cure this great breach in his abused nature;
King Lear 4.7.14-15, CORDELIA TO A GENTLEMAN, of Lear 3 Restoration hang
Thy medicine on my lips.
King Lear 4.7.26-7, CORDELIA kisses LEAR 4 This disease is beyond my practice.
Macbeth 5.1.60, DOCTOR TO A GENTLEWOMAN, of Lady Macbeth's affliction 5 Throw physic to the dogs; I'll none of it.
Macbeth 5.3.47, MACBETH TO HIS DOCTOR
6 With the help of a surgeon he might yet recover, and prove an ass.
Midsummer Nighfs Dream 5.1.305-6, THESEUS TO HIS COMPANIONS, of Bottom performing the part of Pyramus
7 Now put it, God, into the physician's mind To help him to his grave immediately!
Richard II 1.4.59-60, RICHARD TO BUSHY, of John of Gaunt 8 O true apothecary,
Thy drugs are quick.
Romeo and Juliet 5.3.119-20, ROMEO takes the fatal draught 9 Testy sick men, when their deaths be near,
No news but health from their physicians know.
Sonnet 140.7-8
10 Trust not the physician;
His antidotes are poison.
Timon of Athens 4.3.433-4, TIMON TO BANDITS See also ILLNESS AND DISEASE; MADNESS DOCS
11 RAMBURES That island of England breeds very valiant creatures: their mastiffs are of unmatchable courage.
ORLEANS Foolish curs, that run winking into the mouth of a Russian bear and have their heads crushed like rotten apples.
Henry V 3.7.142-6
66 I DOGS
1 The little dogs and all,
Trey, Blanch and Sweetheart, see, they bark at me.
King Lear 3.6.60-1, LEAR TO EDGAR
2 Ask my dog: if he say 'ay', it will; if he say 'no', it will; if he shake his tail, and say nothing, it will.
Two Gentlemen of Verona 2.5.31-2, LAUNCE TO SPEED
3 Nay, I'll be sworn I have sat in the stocks, for puddings he hath stolen, otherwise he had been executed.
Two Gentlemen of Verona 4.4.29-31, LAUNCE, of his dog, whom at 4.4.2-3 he describes as 'One that I brought up of a puppy.'
DREAMS
4 O God, I could be bounded in a nutshell and count myself a king of infinite space - were it not that I have bad dreams.
Hamlet 2.2.255-7, HAMLET TO ROSENCRANTZ AND GUILDENSTERN 5 There is some ill a-brewing towards my rest,
For I did dream of money-bags tonight.
Merchant of Venice 2.5.17-18, SHYLOCK TO LAUNCELOT GOBBO 6 And by the way let us recount our dreams.
Midsummer Night's Dream 4.1.198, DEMETRIUS TO HIS FRIENDS
7 I have had a most rare vision. I have had a dream, past the wit of man to say what dream it was. Man is but an ass if he go about to expound this dream. Methought I was - there is no man can tell what.
Methought I was - and methought I had - but man is but a patched fool if he will offer to say what methought I had. The eye of man hath not heard, the ear of man hath not seen, man's hand is not able to taste, his tongue to conceive, nor his heart to report, what my dream was. I will get Peter Quince to write a ballad of this dream: it shall be called 'Bottom's Dream', because it hath no bottom.
Midsummer Night's Dream 4.1.203-14, BOTTOM'S dream 8 I have passed a miserable night,
So full of fearful dreams, of ugly sights, That, as I am a Christian faithful man, I would not spend another such a night Though 'twere to buy a world of happy days.
Richard III 1.4.2-6, CLARENCE TO THE KEEPER OF THE TOWER 9 Dream on, dream on.
Richard III5.3.172, GHOST OF BUCKINGHAM TO RICHARD, continuing, 'of bloody deeds and death'
DRINKING J 67 1 In dreaming,
The clouds methought would open, and show riches Ready to drop upon me; that, when I waked, I cried to dream again.
Tempest 3.2.142-5, CALIBAN TO STEPHANO AND TRINCULO
2 We are such stuff As dreams are made on.
Tempest 4.1.156-7, PROSPERO TO MIRANDA; more at LIFE; PLAYS, PLAYERS AND PLAYHOUSES
See also SLEEP AND SLEEPLESSNESS
DRINKING
3 Falser than vows made in wine.
As You Like It 3.5.73, ROSALIND TO PHEBE
4 You come in faint for want of meat, depart reeling with too much drink: sorry that you have paid too much, and sorry that you are paid too much: purse and brain, both empty.
Cymbeline 5.4.160-4, GAOLER TO POSTHUMUS
5 We'll teach you to drink deep ere you depart.
Hamlet 1.2.175, HAMLET to his friend HORATIO
6 If sack and sugar be a fault, God help the wicked!
1 Henry IV 2.4.464-5, FALSTAFF TO PRINCE HAL
7 Doth it not show vilely in me to desire small beer?
2 Henry IV 2.2.5-6, PRINCE HAL TO POINS
8 A good sherris-sack . . . ascends me into the brain, dries me there all the foolish and dull and crudy vapours which environ it, makes it apprehensive, quick, forgetive, full of nimble, fiery, and delectable shapes, which delivered o'er to the voice, the tongue, which is the birth, becomes excellent wit.
2 Henry IV 4.3.95-101, part of a much longer speech by FALSTAFF on the benefits of alcohol to the system
9 Was the hope drunk,
Wherein you dressed yourself? Hath it slept since?
Macbeth 1.7.35-6, LADY MACBETH TO MACBETH
10 That which hath made them drunk hath made me bold.
Macbeth 2.2.1, LADY MACBETH
68 I DRINKING
1 Faith, Sir, we were carousing till the second cock.
Macbeth 2.3.23-4, PORTER TO MACBETH
2 [Drink] provokes the desire, but it takes away the performance.
Macbeth 2.3.29-30, PORTER TO MACBETH
3 We'll have a posset for 't soon at night, in faith, at the latter end of a sea-coal fire.
Merry Wives of Windsor 1.4.7-8, MISTRESS QUICKLY TO RUGBY
4 I have very poor and unhappy brains for drinking. I could well wish courtesy would invent some other custom of entertainment.
Othello 2.3.30-2, CASSIO TO IAGO
5 Drunk? and speak parrot? and squabble? swagger? swear? and discourse fustian with one's own shadow?
Othello 2.3.270-2, CASSIO TO IAGO
6 Good wine is a good familiar creature, if it be well used: exclaim no more against it.
Othello 2.3.299-300, IAGO TO CASSIO
7 They were red-hot with drinking;
So full of valour that they smote the air For breathing in their faces.
Tempest 4.1.171-3, ARIEL TO PROSPERO
8 OLIVIA What's a drunken man like, fool?
FESTE Like a drowned man, a fool, and a madman: one draught above heat makes him a fool, the second mads him, and a third drowns him.
Twelfth Night 1.5.127-30 DUTY
9 Every subject's duty is the King's, but every subject's soul is his own.
Henry V 4.1.174-5, HENRY, incognito, to MICHAEL WILLIAMS and JOHN BATES 10 Never anything can be amiss
When simpleness and duty tender it.
Midsummer Night's Dream 5.1.82-3, THESEUS TO PHILOSTRATE AND HIS COMPANIONS 11 I do perceive here a divided duty.
Othello 1.3.181, DESDEMONA, torn between husband and father, to BRABANTIO 12 We must obey the time.
Othello 1.3.302, OTHELLO TO DESDEMONA
DYING WORDS | 69 DYING WORDS
1 I am dying, Egypt, dying. Only I here importune death awhile until Of many thousand kisses the poor last I lay upon thy lips.
Antony and Cleopatra 4.15.19-22, ANTONY TO CLEOPATRA 2 Come, thou mortal wretch,
With thy sharp teeth this knot intrinsicate Of life at once untie.
Antony and Cleopatra 5.2.301-3, CLEOPATRA to the asp which kills her 3 If thou didst ever hold me in thy heart,
Absent thee from felicity awhile,
And in this harsh world draw thy breath in pain To tell my story.
Hamlet 5.2.354-7, HAMLET TO HORATIO 4 The rest is silence.
Hamlet 5.2.367, HAMLET TO HORATIO
5 An old man, broken with the storms of state, Is come to lay his weary bones among ye.
Give him a little earth for charity.
Henry VIII 4.2.21-3, GRIFFITH, an usher, to KATHERINE OF ARAGON, repeating the words of Cardinal Wolsey
6 Et tu, Brute?
Julius Caesar 3.1.77, JULIUS CAESAR TO BRUTUS: 'YOU too, Brutus?' 7 Heaven take my soul, and England keep my bones.
King John 4.3.10, the boy ARTHUR, having leaped from his prison walls 8 Now my soul hath elbow-room.
King John 5.7.28, JOHN TO HIS COMPANIONS 9 There is so hot a summer in my bosom,
That all my bowels crumble up to dust:
I am a scribbled form, drawn with a pen Upon a parchment, and against this fire Do I shrink up.
King John 5.7.30-4, JOHN TO HIS COMPANIONS 10 Pray you undo this button.
King Lear 5.3.308, LEAR TO EDGAR
70 I DYING WORDS 1 Now am I dead
Now am I fled;
My soul is in the sky.
Tongue, lose thy light;
Moon, take thy flight!
Now die, die, die, die, die.
Midsummer Night's Dream 5.1.295-300, the death of PYRAMUS (BOTTOM);
Shakespeare makes fun of his less talented contemporaries 2 The tongues of dying men
Inforce attention like deep harmony.
Richard II 2.1.5-6, JOHN OF GAUNT, near death, to YORK 3 Convey me to my bed, then to my grave -
Love they to live that love and honour have.
Richard II 2.1.137-8, JOHN OF GAUNT TO RICHARD
4 Mount, mount, my soul! thy seat is up on high, Whilst my gross flesh sinks downward, here to die.
Richard II 5.5.111-12, RICHARD
>t%^t%^%^%^ r fc%^*%^%^%^
EAST, the
5 I'th' East my pleasure lies.
Antony and Cleopatra 2.3.29, ANTONY 6 The beds i'th' East are soft.
Antony and Cleopatra 2.6.50, ANTONY TO OCTAVIUS CAESAR AND POMPEY
EASY LIFE
7 Who doth ambition shun And loves to live i'th' sun.
As You Like It 2.5.35-6, AMIENS'S song
8 I were better to be eaten to death with a rust than to be scoured to nothing with perpetual motion.
2 Henry IV 1.2.217-19, FALSTAFF TO THE LORD CHIEF JUSTICE
EDUCATION I 71