William Shakespeare Quotes About Dying

• Cowards die many times before their deaths; the valiant never taste of death but once.

  William Shakespeare

  Inspirational, Death, Running

  'Julius Caesar' (1599) act 2, sc. 2, l. 30

• To die, to sleep - To sleep, perchance to dream - ay, there's the rub, For in this sleep of death what dreams may come.

  William Shakespeare

  Death, Dream, Halloween

  'Hamlet' (1601) act 3, sc. 1, l. 56

• To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow, Creeps in this petty pace from day to day, To the last syllable of recorded time; And all our yesterdays have lighted fools The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle! Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player, That struts and frets his hour upon the stage, And then is heard no more. It is a tale Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, Signifying nothing.

  William Shakespeare

  Inspirational, Life, Death

  'Macbeth' (1606) act 5, sc. 5, l. 16

• Fear no more the heat o' th' sun Nor the furious winters' rages; Thou thy worldly task hast done, Home art gone, and ta'en thy wages. Golden lads and girls all must, As chimney-sweepers, come to dust.

  William Shakespeare

  Girl, Death, Art

  'Cymbeline' (1609-10) act 4, sc. 2, l. 258

• O comfort-killing night, image of hell, Dim register and notary of shame, Black stage for tragedies and murders fell, Vast sin-concealing chaos, nurse of blame!

  William Shakespeare

  Death, Night, Nurse

  William Shakespeare (2006). “The Poems: Venus and Adonis, The Rape of Lucrece, The Phoenix and the Turtle, The Passionate Pilgrim, A Lover's Complaint”, p.188, Cambridge University Press

• For in that sleep of death what dreams may come.

  William Shakespeare

  Death, Dream, Sleep

  'Hamlet' (1601) act 3, sc. 1, l. 56

• Ay, but to die and go we know not where; To lie in cold obstrution and to rot; This sensible warm motion to become A kneaded clod; and the delighted spirit To bathe in fiery floods or to reside In thrilling regions of thick-ribbed ice; To be imprison'd in the viewless winds, And blown with restless violence round about The pendant world.

  William Shakespeare

  Death, Lying, Ice

  'Measure for Measure' (1604) act 3, sc. 1, l. 114

• The tongues of dying men enforce attention like deep harmony.

  William Shakespeare

  Peace, Men, Dying

  William Shakespeare, Charles R. Forker (2002). “King Richard II: Third Series”, p.242, Cengage Learning EMEA

• Farewell, a long farewell to all my greatness! This is the state of man: today he puts forth The tender leaves of hope, tomorrow blossoms, And bears his blushing honours thick upon him: The third day comes a frost, a killing frost, And - when he thinks, good easy man, full surely His greatness is a-ripening - nips his root, And then he falls, as I do.

  William Shakespeare

  Death, Fall, Farewell

  'Henry VIII' (1613) act 3, sc. 2, l. 352

• I care not, a man can die but once; we owe God and death.

  William Shakespeare

  Death, Men, Dying

  'Henry IV, Part 2' (1597) act 3, sc. 2, l. [253].

• The weariest and most loathed worldly life, that age, ache, penury and imprisonment can lay on nature is a paradise, to what we fear of death.

  William Shakespeare

  Death, Dying, Age

  'Measure for Measure' (1604) act 3, sc. 1, l. 114

• When Death doth close his tender dying eyes.

  William Shakespeare

  Death, Eye, Dying

  William Shakespeare (2015). “King Henry the Sixth: Parts I, II, and III”, p.57, Hackett Publishing

• Oh, injurious love, that respites me a life, whose very comfort is still a dying horror

  William Shakespeare

  Love You, Dying, Comfort

  William Shakespeare, Edmond Malone, James Boswell, Samuel Johnson, Mr. Theobald (Lewis) (1821). “The Plays and Poems of William Shakspeare: With the Corrections and Illustrations of Various Commentators”, p.74

• Come my spade. There is no ancient gentlemen but gardeners, ditchers, and grave-makers; they hold up Adam's profession.

  William Shakespeare

  Death, Gentleman, Dying

  'Hamlet' (1601) act 5, sc. 1, l. [32]

• 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 as it was before.

  William Shakespeare

  Love, Sweet, Fall

  'Twelfth Night' (1601) act 1, sc. 1, l. 1

• After life's fitful fever he sleeps well. Treason has done his worst. Nor steel nor poison, malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing can touch him further.

  William Shakespeare

  Death, Prayer, Sleep

  'Macbeth' (1606) act 3, sc. 2, l. 11

• Men must endure Their going hence, even as their coming hither. Ripeness is all.

  William Shakespeare

  Life, Death, Men

  'King Lear' (1605-6) act 5, sc. 2, l. 9

• Our remedies oft in ourselves do lie, Which we ascribe to Heaven.

  William Shakespeare

  Death, Lying, Heaven

  'All's Well that Ends Well' (1603-4) act 1, sc. 1, l. [235]

• Every subject's duty is the King's; but every subject's soul is his own. Therefore, should every soldier in the wars do as every sick man in his bed, wash every mote out of his conscience; and dying so, death is to him advantage; or not dying, the time was blessedly lost wherein such preparation was gained; and in him that escapes, it were no sin to think that, making God so free an offer, He let him outlive the day to see His greatness and to teach others how they should prepare.

  William Shakespeare

  Kings, War, Greatness

  William Shakespeare (2012). “The Complete Works of William Shakespeare”, p.2393, Graphic Arts Books

• O, but they say, the tongues of dying men enforce attention, like deep harmony: where words are scarce, they are seldom spent in vain: for they breathe truth, that breathe their words in pain. he, that no more must say, is listened more than they whom youth and ease have taught to gloze; more are men's ends marked, than their lives before: the setting sun, and music at the close, as the last taste of sweets, is sweetest last; writ in rememberance more than things long past

  William Shakespeare

  Sweet, Pain, Past

  William Shakespeare, Charles R. Forker (2002). “King Richard II: Third Series”, p.242, Cengage Learning EMEA

• An old man, broken with the storms of state,
  Is come to lay his weary bones among ye;
  Give him a little earth for charity!

  William Shakespeare

  Men, Broken, Giving

  'Henry VIII' (1613) act 4, sc. 2, l. 21

• They say, the tongues of dying men
  Enforce attention, like deep harmony;
  Where words are scarce, they're seldom spent in vain;
  For they breathe truth, that breathe their words in pain.

  William Shakespeare

  Pain, Men, Dying

  William Shakespeare, Charles R. Forker (2002). “King Richard II: Third Series”, p.242, Cengage Learning EMEA

• One good deed dying tongueless Slaughters a thousand waiting upon that. Our praises are our wages.

  William Shakespeare

  Death, Waiting, Dying

  1609 Hermione. The Winter's Tale, act1, sc.2, l.94-5.

• To fear the foe, since fear oppresseth strength,
  Gives, in your weakness, strength unto your foe,
  And so your follies fight against yourself.
  Fear, and be slain--so worse can come to fight;
  And fight and die is death destroying death,
  Where fearing dying pays death servile breath.

  William Shakespeare

  Fear, Fighting, Giving

  William Shakespeare (2013). “The Wars of the Roses In Plain and Simple English: Includes Henry VI Parts 1 - 3 & Richard III, Richard II, Henry IV Parts 1 and 2, and Henry V”, p.1097, BookCaps Study Guides

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