Ben Jonson Quotes
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The dignity of truth is lost With much protesting.
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A good life is a main argument.
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He that fears death, or mourns it, in the just, Shows of the resurrection little trust.
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Thy praise or dispraise is to me alike; One doth not stroke me, nor the other strike.
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Of all wild beasts preserve me from a tyrant; and of all tame, a flatterer.
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Soul of the age! The applause, delight, the wonder of our stage! My Shakespeare, rise; I will not lodge thee by Chaucer or Spenser, or bid Beaumont lie A little further, to make thee a room; Thou art a monument, without a tomb, And art alive still, while thy book doth live, And we have wits to read, and praise to give.
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What gentle ghost, besprent with April dew, Hails me so solemnly to yonder yew?
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That Shakespeare wanted Art.
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Where dost thou careless lie, Buried in ease and sloth? Knowledge that sleeps, doth die; And this security, It is the common moth, That eats on wits and arts, and oft destroys them both.
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Folly often goes beyond her bounds; but Impudence knows none.
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Pray thee, take care, that tak'st my book in hand, To read it well: that is, to understand.
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That old bald cheater, Time.
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Talking and eloquence are not the same: to speak, and to speak well, are two things. A fool may talk, but a wise man speaks...
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If all you boast of your great art be true; Sure, willing poverty lives most in you.
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It is not growing like a tree In bulk, doth make man better be; Or standing long an oak, three hundred year, To fall a log, dry, bald and sere: A lily of a day, Is fairer far, in May, Although it fall, and die that night; It was the plant and flower of light. In small proportions we just beauties see, And in short measures life may perfect be.
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I remember the players have often mentioned it as an honor to Shakespeare, that in his writing, whatsoever he penned, he never blotted out a line. My answer hath been, 'Would he had blotted a thousand'.
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Hang sorrow! care'll kill a cat.
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Though the most be players, some must be spectators.
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Shakespeare, in a play, brought in a number of men saying they had suffered shipwreck in Bohemia, where there is no sea by some 100 miles.
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As he brews, so shall he drink.
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Thou look'st like Antichrist in that lewd hat.
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Have paid scot and lot there any time this eighteen years.
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Those that merely talk and never think, That live in the wild anarchy of drink.
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Queen and huntress, chaste and fair, Now the sun is laid to sleep, Seated in thy silver chair, State in wonted manner keep: Hesperus entreats thy light, Goddess, excellently bright.