The Rape of Lucrece
William Shakespeare
Top 10 Best Quotes
“What win I, if I gain the thing I seek? A dream, a breath, a froth of fleeting joy. Who buys a minute's mirth to wail a week? Or sells eternity to get a toy? For one sweet grape who will the vine destroy? Or what fond beggar, but to touch the crown, Would with the sceptre straight be strucken down?”
“What win I if I gain the thing I seek? A dream, a breath, a froth of fleeting joy. Who buys a minute's mirth to wail a week? Or sells eternity to get a toy?”
“Those that much covet are with gain so fond, For what they have not, that which they possess They scatter and unloose it from their bond, And so, by hoping more, they have but less; Or, gaining more, the profit of excess Is but to surfeit, and such griefs sustain, That they prove bankrupt in this poor-rich gain.”
“Beauty itself doth of itself persuade The eyes of men without orator.”
“But no perfection is so absolute That some inpurity doth not pollute.”
“She smiled with so sweet a cheer That had Narcissus seen her as she stood Self-love had never drowned him in the flood”
“Why should the private pleasure of some one Become the public plague of many moe? Let sin, alone committed, light alone Upon his head that hath transgressed so; Let guiltless souls be freed from guilty woe: For one's offence why should so many fall, To plague a private sin in general?”
“No man inveigh against the withered flower, But chide rough winter that the flower hath killed.”
“Her lily hand her rosy cheek lies under, Cozening the pillow of a lawful kiss; Who, therefore angry, seems to part in sunder, Swelling on either side to want his bliss; Between whose hills her head entombed is; Where like a virtuous monument she lies, To be admired of lewd unhallowed eyes. Without the bed her other fair hand was, On the green coverlet, whose perfect white Showed like an April daisy on the grass, With pearly sweat resembling dew of night. Her eyes, like marigolds, had sheathed their light, And canopied in darkness sweetly lay Till they might open to adorn the day. Her hair like golden threads played with her breath O modest wantons, wanton modesty! Showing life’s triumph in the map of death, And death’s dim look in life’s mortality. Each in her sleep themselves so beautify As if between them twain there were no strife, But that life lived in death, and death in life.”
“And my true eyes have never practis'd how To cloak offences with a cunning brow”
Except where otherwise noted, all rights reserved to the author(s) of this book (mentioned above). The content of this page serves solely as promotional material for the aforementioned book. If you enjoyed these quotes, you can support the author(s) by acquiring the full book from Amazon.
Book Keywords:
desires, fleeting-possession, tempest, artless, gain, tragedy, beauty, entitlement, excess, greed, sandman, neil-gaiman, insatiability, possessions, cunning, destruction
