Twelfth Night Quotes

“Be not afraid of greatness. Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and others have greatness thrust upon them.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“If music be the food of love, play on;
Give me excess of it, that, surfeiting,
The appetite may sicken, and so die.
That strain again! it had a dying fall:
O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet sound,
That breathes upon a bank of violets,
Stealing and giving odour! Enough; no more:
'Tis not so sweet now as it was before.
O spirit of love! how quick and fresh art thou,
That, notwithstanding thy capacity
Receiveth as the sea, nought enters there,
Of what validity and pitch soe'er,
But falls into abatement and low price,
Even in a minute: so full of shapes is fancy
That it alone is high fantastical.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon them. Your fate awaits you. Accept it in body and spirit. To get used to the life you'll most likely be leading soon, get rid of your low-class trappings.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Better a witty fool, than a foolish wit.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Journeys end in lovers meeting,
Every wise man's son doth know.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“a young woman in love always looks like patience on a monument smiling at grief”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Love sought is good, but giv'n unsought is better.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“I say, there is no darkness
but ignorance; in which thou art more puzzled than
the Egyptians in their fog.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“O time, thou must untangle this, not I.
It is too hard a knot for me t'untie.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“She never told her love, but let concealment, like a worm 'i th' bud, feed on her damask cheek. She pinned in thought; and, with a green and yellow melancholy, she sat like Patience on a monument, smiling at grief. Was not this love indeed? We men may say more, swear more; but indeed our shows are more than will; for we still prove much in our vows but little in our love.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“How does he love me?
With adoration, with fertile tears,
With groans that thunder love, with sighs of fire.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“In nature there's no blemish but the mind;
None can be called deformed but the unkind:
Virtue is beauty, but the beauteous evil
Are empty trunks, o'erflourished by the devil.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Foolery, sir, does walk about the orb like the sun; it shines everywhere.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“This fellow is wise enough to play the fool;
And to do that well craves a kind of wit:
He must observe their mood on whom he jests,
The quality of persons, and the time,
And, like the haggard, check at every feather
That comes before his eye. This is a practise
As full of labour as a wise man's art
For folly that he wisely shows is fit;
But wise men, folly-fall'n, quite taint their wit.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Well, God give them wisdom that have it; and those that are fools, let them use their talents.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Will you stay no longer? nor will you not that I go with you?
Sebastian: By your patience, no. My stars shine darkly over me; the malignancy of my fate might, perhaps, distemper yours; therefore I shall crave of you your leave that I may bear my evils alone. It were a bad recompense for your love to lay any of them on you.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“I have unclasp'd to thee the book even of my secret soul.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Come away, come away, Death,
And in sad cypress let me be laid;
Fly away, fly away, breath,
I am slain by a fair cruel maid.
My shroud of white stuck all with yew, O prepare it!
My part of death no one so true did share it.

Not a flower, not a flower sweet,
On my black coffin let there be strewn:
Not a friend, not a friend greet
My poor corpse, where my bones shall be thrown.
A thousand thousand sighs to save, lay me O where
Sad true lover never find my grave, to weep there!”
― William Shakespeare, TWELFTH NIGHT

“Conceal me what I am, and be my aid for such disguise as haply shall become the form of my intent.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“My stars shine darkly over
me”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Good Madonna, why mournest thou?
Good Fool, for my brother's death.
I think his soul is in hell, Madonna.
I know his soul is in heaven, Fool.
The more fool, Madonna, to mourn for your brother's soul being in heaven.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“But, indeed, words are very rascals, since bonds [vows] disgraced them."
Viola: "Thy reason, man?"
Feste: "Troth [Truthfully], sir, I can yield you none without words, and words are grown so false, I am loathe to prove reason with them.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Alas, the frailty is to blame, not we
For such as we are made of, such we be”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Dost thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale?”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Many a good hanging prevents a bad marriage.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“For what says Quinapalus? Better a witty fool than a foolish wit.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Lady, you are the cruel'st she alive
If you will lead these graces to the grave
And leave the world no copy.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“I am indeed not her fool, but her corrupter of words. (Act III, sc. I, 37-38)”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“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.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night

“Where lies your text?
Viola: In Orsino's bosom.
Olivia: In his bosom! In what chapter of his bosom?
Viola: To answer by the method, in the first of his heart.”
― William Shakespeare, Twelfth Night