Thrice Quotes

• Twice and thrice over, as they say, good is it to repeat and review what is good.

  Plato

  Workout, Philosophical, Reviews

  Plato (1871). “Gorgias. Philebus. Parmenides. Theaetetus. Sophist. Statesman”, p.89

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• The tyrant custom, most grave senators,
  Hath made the flinty and steel couch of war
  My thrice-driven bed of down.

  William Shakespeare

  War, Tyrants, Bed

  'Othello' (1602-4) act 1, sc. 3, l. [230]

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• What stronger breastplate than a heart untainted! Thrice is he arm'd, that hath his quarrel just.

  William Shakespeare

  Heart, Stronger, Arms

  William Shakespeare (1833). “The plays and poems of William Shakspeare”, p.478

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• And all who heard should see them there, And all should cry, Beware! Beware! His flashing eyes, his floating hair! Weave a circle round him thrice, And close your eyes with holy dread, For he on honey-dew hath fed, And drunk the milk of Paradise.

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge

  Eye, Hair, Circles

  "Kubla Khan" l. 51 (1816)

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• Go, write it in a martial hand; be curst and brief; it is no matter how witty, so it be eloquent and fun of invention: taunt him with the licence of ink: if thou thou'st him some thrice, it shall not be amiss; and as many lies as will lie in thy shee.

  William Shakespeare

  Witty, Fun, Lying

  William Shakespeare, Samuel Johnson, George Steevens, Isaac Reed (1778). “The Plays of William Shakespeare in Ten Volumes: With Corrections and Illustrations of Various Commentators”, p.232

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• The merry cuckow, messenger of Spring, His trumpet shrill hath thrice already sounded.

  Edmund Spenser

  Spring, Cuckoos, Messengers

  Edmund Spenser, Joseph von Hammer-Purgstall (1814). “Spenser's Sonnets”, p.38

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• They say fish should swim thrice * * * first it should swim in the sea (do you mind me?) then it should swim in butter, and at last, sirrah, it should swim in good claret.

  Jonathan Swift

  Food, Lakes, Sea

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• Twice or thrice had I loved thee before I knew thy face or name, so in a voice, so in a shapeless flame, angels affect us oft, and worshiped be.

  John Donne

  Love, Angel, Flames

  'Songs and Sonnets' 'Air and Angels'

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• Once lucky, twice confident, and thrice dead.

  Terry Goodkind

  Lucky

  "Blood of the Fold". Book by Terry Goodkind, 1996.

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• Winter, which, being full of care, makes summer's welcome thrice more wish'd, more rare.

  William Shakespeare

  Summer, Winter, Wish

  William Shakespeare (1833). “The plays and poems of William Shakspeare”, p.927

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• Fish must swim thrice--once is the water, a second time in the sauce, and a third time in wine in the stomach.

  John Ray

  Wine, Water, Swim

  John Ray (1818). “A compleat collection of English proverbs. To which is added, A collection of English words not generally used. Repr. verbatim from the ed. of 1768”, p.23

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• Villains, vipers, damn'd without redemption;
  Dogs, easily won to fawn on any man;
  Snakes in my heart-blood warm'd, that sing my heart;
  Three Judases, each one thrice worse than Judas.

  William Shakespeare

  Dog, Heart, Men

  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.1094, BookCaps Study Guides

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• I speak as a man of the world to men of the world; and I say to you, Search the Scriptures! The Bible is the book of all others, to be read at all ages, and in all conditions of human life; not to be read once or twice or thrice through, and then laid aside, but to be read in small portions of one or two chapters every day, and never to be intermitted, unless by some overruling necessity.

  John Quincy Adams

  Life, Book, Men

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• I feel like Twitter was tailor-made for me, because I can do short spurts all day long. I loved my blog, but doing daily, then thrice weekly entries was really time consuming. 140 characters is perfect.

  Sarah Dessen

  Character, Perfect, Long

  Interview with Claire Zulkey, www.wbez.org. January 13, 2012.

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• Either to die the death or to abjure For ever the society of men. Therefore, fair Hermia, question your desires; Know of your youth, examine well your blood, Whether, if you yield not to your father's choice, You can endure the livery of a nun, For aye to be in shady cloister mew'd, To live a barren sister all your life, Chanting faint hymns to the cold fruitless moon. Thrice-blessed they that master so their blood, To undergo such maiden pilgrimage; But earthlier happy is the rose distill'd, Than that which withering on the virgin thorn Grows, lives and dies in single blessedness.

  William Shakespeare

  Father, Blessed, Moon

  William Shakespeare (1864). “The Works of William Shakespeare”, p.162

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• And thrice do I say to thee...bite me.

  Jim Butcher

  Thee, Bite Me, Bites

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• I anticipate the day when to command respect in the remotest regions it will be sufficient to say I am an American. Our flag shall then wave in glory over the ocean and our commerce feel no restraint but what our own government may impose. Happy thrice happy day. Thank God, to reach this envied state we need only to will. Yes my countrymen. Our destiny depends on our will. But if we would stand high on the record of time that will must be inflexible.

  Gouverneur Morris

  Ocean, Destiny, Government

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• Thrice happy's the wooing that's not long adoing. So much time is saved in the billing and cooing.

  Richard Harris Barham

  Long, Billing, Saved

  Richard Harris Barham (1867). “The Ingoldsby legends; or, Mirth and marvels, by Thomas Ingoldsby. Carmine ed”, p.226

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• The Sacrament [of the Holy Eucharist] is the Gift of gifts, and the Grace of graces. When the almighty and eternal God comes to us with all the perfection of His thrice holy humanity and His divinity, He surely does not come empty-handed.

  Angela of Foligno

  Holy Eucharist, Perfection, Humanity

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• Aerial spirits, by great Jove design'd To be on earth the guardians of mankind: Invisible to mortal eyes they go, And mark our actions, good or bad, below: The immortal spies with watchful care preside, And thrice ten thousand round their charges glide: They can reward with glory or with gold, A power they by Divine permission hold.

  Hesiod

  Eye, Design, Spy

  Hesiod (1822). “The British Poets: Including Translations. In One Hundred Volumes. LXXXVIII”, p.43

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• Let not sleep fall upon thy eyes till thou has thrice reviewed the transactions of the past day. Where have I turned aside from rectitude? What have I been doing? What have I left undone, which I ought to have done?

  Pythagoras

  Fall, Sleep, Eye

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• One learned gentleman, "a sage grave man," Talk'd of the Ghost in Hamlet, "sheath'd in steel"— His well-read friend, who next to speak began, Said, "That was poetry, and nothing real;" A third, of more extensive learning, ran To Sir George Villiers' Ghost, and Mrs. Veal; Of sheeted Spectres spoke with shorten'd breath, And thrice he quoted Drelincourt on Death.

  Bill Vaughan

  Real, Men, Gentleman

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• There is an utterance of Necessity, an ancient decree of the gods, eternal, sealed fast with broad oaths: whenever any one defiles his body sinfully with bloody gore or perjures himself in regard to wrong-doing, one of those spirits who are heir to long life, thrice ten thousand seasons shall he wander apart from the blessed, being born meantime in all sorts of mortal forms, changing one bitter path of life for another.

  Empedocles

  Blessed, Long, Utterance

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• Unjust war is to be abhorred; but woe to the nation that does not make ready to hold its own in time of need against all who would harm it! And woe thrice over to the nation in which the average man loses the fighting edge, loses the power to serve as a soldier if the day of need should arise!

  Theodore Roosevelt

  War, Fighting, Men

  Theodore Roosevelt (2006). “History as Literature and Other Essays”, p.131, Cosimo, Inc.

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• I who still pray at morning and at eve Thrice in my life perhaps have truly prayed, Thrice stirred below conscious self Have felt that perfect disenthrallment which is God.

  James Russell Lowell

  Morning, Self, Perfect

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