Quotes from As You Like It

William Shakespeare ·  263 pages

Rating: (64.1K votes)


“The fool doth think he is wise, but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“Do you not know I am a woman? when I think, I must speak.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first, the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms.
Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“I pray you, do not fall in love with me, for I am falser than vows made in wine.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It



“Love is merely a madness; and, I tell you, deserves as well a dark house and a whip as madmen do; and the reason why they are not so punish'd and cured is that the lunacy is so
ordinary that the whippers are in love too.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“Men have died from time to time, and worms have eaten them, but not for love.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“And this our life, exempt from public haunt, finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks, sermons in stones, and good in everything. I would not change it.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“Sweet are the uses of adversity
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“No sooner met but they looked; no sooner looked but they loved; no sooner loved but they sighed; no sooner sighed but they asked one another the reason; no sooner knew the reason but they sought the remedy; and in these degrees have they made a pair of stairs to marriage...”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It



“All the world's a stage, and all the men and women merely players.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“Time travels at different speeds for different people. I can tell you who time strolls for, who it trots for, who it gallops for, and who it stops cold for.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“Most friendship is feigning, most loving mere folly.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“I was too young that time to value her,
But now I know her. If she be a traitor,
Why, so am I. We still have slept together,
Rose at an instant, learned, played, eat together,
And wheresoe'er we went, like Juno's swans,
Still we went coupled and inseparable.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“JAQUES: Rosalind is your love's name?

ORLANDO: Yes, just.

JAQUES: I do not like her name.

ORLANDO: There was no thought of pleasing you when she was christened.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It



“Men are April when they woo, December when they wed...”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“But it is a melancholy of mine own, compounded of many simples, extracted from many objects, and indeed the sundry contemplation of my travels, which, by often rumination, wraps me in the most humorous sadness.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“Master, go on, and I will follow thee
To the last gasp with truth and loyalty.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“O wonderful, wonderful, and most wonderful wonderful! And yet again wonderful, and after that, out of all hooping.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“Under the greenwood tree,
Who loves to lie with me
And tune his merry note,
Unto the sweet bird's throat;
Come hither, come hither, come hither.
Here shall he see
No enemy
But winter and rough weather.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It



“Sweet are the uses of adversity,
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head;
And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in every thing.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“I'll have no husband, if you be not he.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“My affection hath an unknown bottom, like the Bay of Portugal.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“Thou seest we are not all alone unhappy:
This wide and universal theatre
Presents more woeful pageants than the scene
Wherein we play in.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“Truly thou art damned, like an ill-roasted egg, all on one side.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It



“Your gentleness shall force
More than your force move us to gentleness.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players:
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


“It is far easier for me to teach twenty what were right to be done, than be one of the twenty to follow mine own teaching.”
― William Shakespeare, quote from As You Like It


About the author

William Shakespeare
Born place: Stratford-upon-Avon, Warwickshire, England, The United Kingdom
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