#
Result number
|
Work
The work is either a play, poem, or sonnet. The sonnets
are treated as single work with 154 parts.
|
Character
Indicates who said the line. If it's a play or sonnet,
the character name is "Poet."
|
Line
Shows where the line falls within the work.
The numbering is not keyed to any copyrighted numbering system found in a volume of
collected works (Arden, Oxford, etc.) The numbering starts at the beginning of the work, and does not
restart for each scene.
|
Text
The line's full text, with keywords highlighted
within it, unless highlighting has been disabled by the user.
|
1 |
All's Well That Ends Well
[I, 1] |
Helena |
204 |
So is running away, when fear proposes the safety;
but the composition that your valour and fear makes
in you is a virtue of a good wing, and I like the wear well.
|
2 |
All's Well That Ends Well
[IV, 3] |
Second Lord |
2105 |
He hath perverted a young gentlewoman here in
Florence, of a most chaste renown; and this night he
fleshes his will in the spoil of her honour: he hath
given her his monumental ring, and thinks himself
made in the unchaste composition.
|
3 |
Antony and Cleopatra
[II, 6] |
Pompey |
1283 |
I hope so, Lepidus. Thus we are agreed:
I crave our composition may be written,
And seal'd between us.
|
4 |
Coriolanus
[III, 1] |
Titus Lartius |
1727 |
He had, my lord; and that it was which caused
Our swifter composition.
|
5 |
Henry IV, Part II
[II, 2] |
Edward Poins |
954 |
Why, a prince should not be so loosely studied as to
remember so weak a composition.
|
6 |
Henry VI, Part I
[II, 3] |
Lord Talbot/Earl of Shrewsbury |
906 |
Be not dismay'd, fair lady; nor misconstrue
The mind of Talbot, as you did mistake
The outward composition of his body.
What you have done hath not offended me;
Nor other satisfaction do I crave,
But only, with your patience, that we may
Taste of your wine and see what cates you have;
For soldiers' stomachs always serve them well.
|
7 |
King John
[I, 1] |
Queen Elinor |
91 |
He hath a trick of Coeur-de-lion's face;
The accent of his tongue affecteth him.
Do you not read some tokens of my son
In the large composition of this man?
|
8 |
King John
[II, 1] |
Philip the Bastard |
876 |
Mad world! mad kings! mad composition!
John, to stop Arthur's title in the whole,
Hath willingly departed with a part,
And France, whose armour conscience buckled on,
Whom zeal and charity brought to the field
As God's own soldier, rounded in the ear
With that same purpose-changer, that sly devil,
That broker, that still breaks the pate of faith,
That daily break-vow, he that wins of all,
Of kings, of beggars, old men, young men, maids,
Who, having no external thing to lose
But the word 'maid,' cheats the poor maid of that,
That smooth-faced gentleman, tickling Commodity,
Commodity, the bias of the world,
The world, who of itself is peised well,
Made to run even upon even ground,
Till this advantage, this vile-drawing bias,
This sway of motion, this Commodity,
Makes it take head from all indifferency,
From all direction, purpose, course, intent:
And this same bias, this Commodity,
This bawd, this broker, this all-changing word,
Clapp'd on the outward eye of fickle France,
Hath drawn him from his own determined aid,
From a resolved and honourable war,
To a most base and vile-concluded peace.
And why rail I on this Commodity?
But for because he hath not woo'd me yet:
Not that I have the power to clutch my hand,
When his fair angels would salute my palm;
But for my hand, as unattempted yet,
Like a poor beggar, raileth on the rich.
Well, whiles I am a beggar, I will rail
And say there is no sin but to be rich;
And being rich, my virtue then shall be
To say there is no vice but beggary.
Since kings break faith upon commodity,
Gain, be my lord, for I will worship thee.
|
9 |
King Lear
[I, 2] |
Edmund |
334 |
Thou, Nature, art my goddess; to thy law
My services are bound. Wherefore should I
Stand in the plague of custom, and permit
The curiosity of nations to deprive me,
For that I am some twelve or fourteen moonshines
Lag of a brother? Why bastard? wherefore base?
When my dimensions are as well compact,
My mind as generous, and my shape as true,
As honest madam's issue? Why brand they us
With base? with baseness? bastardy? base, base?
Who, in the lusty stealth of nature, take
More composition and fierce quality
Than doth, within a dull, stale, tired bed,
Go to th' creating a whole tribe of fops
Got 'tween asleep and wake? Well then,
Legitimate Edgar, I must have your land.
Our father's love is to the bastard Edmund
As to th' legitimate. Fine word- 'legitimate'!
Well, my legitimate, if this letter speed,
And my invention thrive, Edmund the base
Shall top th' legitimate. I grow; I prosper.
Now, gods, stand up for bastards!
|
10 |
King Lear
[II, 2] |
Earl of Kent |
1087 |
A knave; a rascal; an eater of broken meats; a base, proud,
shallow, beggarly, three-suited, hundred-pound, filthy,
worsted-stocking knave; a lily-liver'd, action-taking, whoreson,
glass-gazing, superserviceable, finical rogue;
one-trunk-inheriting slave; one that wouldst be a bawd in way of
good service, and art nothing but the composition of a knave,
beggar, coward, pander, and the son and heir of a mongrel bitch;
one whom I will beat into clamorous whining, if thou deny the
least syllable of thy addition.
|
11 |
Macbeth
[I, 2] |
Ross |
86 |
That now
Sweno, the Norways' king, craves composition:
Nor would we deign him burial of his men
Till he disbursed at Saint Colme's inch
Ten thousand dollars to our general use.
|
12 |
Measure for Measure
[I, 2] |
Lucio |
98 |
If the duke with the other dukes come not to
composition with the King of Hungary, why then all
the dukes fall upon the king.
|
13 |
Measure for Measure
[V, 1] |
Angelo |
2624 |
My lord, I must confess I know this woman:
And five years since there was some speech of marriage
Betwixt myself and her; which was broke off,
Partly for that her promised proportions
Came short of composition, but in chief
For that her reputation was disvalued
In levity: since which time of five years
I never spake with her, saw her, nor heard from her,
Upon my faith and honour.
|
14 |
Othello
[I, 3] |
Duke of Venice |
327 |
There is no composition in these news
That gives them credit.
|
15 |
Richard II
[II, 1] |
John of Gaunt |
757 |
O how that name befits my composition!
Old Gaunt indeed, and gaunt in being old:
Within me grief hath kept a tedious fast;
And who abstains from meat that is not gaunt?
For sleeping England long time have I watch'd;
Watching breeds leanness, leanness is all gaunt:
The pleasure that some fathers feed upon,
Is my strict fast; I mean, my children's looks;
And therein fasting, hast thou made me gaunt:
Gaunt am I for the grave, gaunt as a grave,
Whose hollow womb inherits nought but bones.
|
16 |
Sonnet 45 |
Shakespeare |
617 |
The other two, slight air and purging fire,
Are both with thee, wherever I abide;
The first my thought, the other my desire,
These present-absent with swift motion slide.
For when these quicker elements are gone
In tender embassy of love to thee,
My life, being made of four, with two alone
Sinks down to death, oppress'd with melancholy;
Until life's composition be recured
By those swift messengers return'd from thee,
Who even but now come back again, assured
Of thy fair health, recounting it to me:
This told, I joy; but then no longer glad,
I send them back again and straight grow sad.
|