“If you put a chain around the neck of a slave, the other end fastens itself around your own.”

“Perpetual modernness is the measure of merit, in every work of art; since the author of it was not misled by anything short- livedor local, but abode by real and abiding traits.”

“The cruelest foe is a masked benefactor. The wars which make history so dreary have served the cause of truth and virtue.”

“Let us draw a lesson from nature, which always works by short ways. When the fruit is ripe, it falls.”

“I could better eat with one who did not respect the truth or the laws, than with a sloven and unpresentable person. Moral qualities rule the world, but at shorter distances, the senses are despotic.”

“Is there no respect of place, persons, nor time in you?”

“Manners require time, and nothing is more vulgar than haste.”

“Defect in manners is usually the defect of fine perceptions. Elegance comes of no breeding, but of birth.”

“Benvolio- "By my head, here come the Capulets." Mercutio- "By my heel, I care not.”

“Some report a sea-maid spawn'd him; some that he was begot between two stock-fishes. But it is certain that when he makes water his urine is congealed ice.”

“Free from gross passion or of mirth of anger constant spirit, not swerving with the blood, garnish'd and deck'd in modest compliment, not working with the eye without the ear, and but in purged judgement trusting neither? Such and so finely bolted didst thou seem.”

“I am not bound to please thee with my answer.”

“Call me what instrument you will, though you can fret me, you cannot play upon me.”

“In maiden meditation, fancy free.”

“Rich gifts wax poor when givers prove unkind.”

“In nature there's no blemish but the mind. None can be called deformed but the unkind.”

“A woman would run through fire and water for such a kind heart.”