Best 135+ WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE Quotes By THEME!

“To be, or not to be? That is the question!”

William Shakespeare was an English poet, playwright, and actor. Shakespeare was born in the 1500’s, but his plays are just as popular today as they were when he was alive! Some of Shakespeare’s most famous plays include:

Romeo And Juliet
Hamlet
The Tempest
Twelfth Night
Macbeth

…And many more.

Shakespeare was one of the best English writers of all time, and it’s easy to see why. His plays feature timeless quotes about life, love, relationships, and more.

Whether you’re interested in deep philosophical quotes about life, funny Shakespeare quotes, or hot and heavy Shakespeare quotes about love and romance, we’ve got you covered!

Without further ado, here are the best William Shakespeare quotes by theme!

Table of Contents

Best William Shakespeare Quotes About Friendship

“Keep thy friend, under thy own life’s key.” -William Shakespeare
“But where there is true friendship, there needs none.” -William Shakespeare
“A friend should bear his friend’s infirmities.” -William Shakespeare
“Madam, you wrong the King’s love with these fears; / Your hopes and friends are infinite.” -William Shakespeare
“If thou wilt lend this money, lend it not / As to thy friends; for when did friendship take / A breed for barren metal of his friend?” -William Shakespeare
“Thy friendship makes us fresh.” -William Shakespeare
“Thou common friend, that’s without faith or love- / For such is a friend now; treacherous man, / Thou hast beguil’d my hopes; nought but mine eye.” -William Shakespeare
Could have persuaded me.” -William Shakespeare
“This life is most jolly.” -William Shakespeare
“The presence of a king engenders love / Amongst his subjects and his loyal friends, / As it disanimates his enemies.” -William Shakespeare
“But if the while I think on thee, dear friend, all losses are restored and sorrows end.” -William Shakespeare
“To Milan let me hear from thee by letters / Of thy success in love, and what news else / Betideth here in absence of thy friend; / And I likewise will visit thee with mine.” -William Shakespeare
“Madam, you wrong the King’s love with these fears; / Your hopes and friends are infinite.” -William Shakespeare
“Away, boy, from the troops, and save thyself; / For friends kill friends, and the disorder’s such / As war were hoodwink’d.” -William Shakespeare
“To mingle friendship far is mingling bloods.” -William Shakespeare
“Those friends thou hast, and their adoption tried, / Grapple them unto thy soul with hoops of steel.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes About Life

“Let me be that I am and seek not to alter me.” -William Shakespeare
“Is this a dagger which I see before me, the handle toward my hand?” -William Shakespeare
“Beware the Ides of March.” -William Shakespeare
“Full fathom five thy father lies, of his bones are coral made. Those are pearls that were his eyes. Nothing of him that doth fade, but doth suffer a sea-change into something rich and strange.” -William Shakespeare
“If you prick us, do we not bleed? If you tickle us, do we not laugh? If you poison us, do we not die? And if you wrong us, shall we not revenge?” -William Shakespeare
“To do were as easy as to know what were good to do, chapels had been churches, and poor men’s cottage princes’ palaces.” -William Shakespeare
“Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears: I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.” -William Shakespeare
“Thy life’s a miracle.” -William Shakespeare
“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
“How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child!” -William Shakespeare
“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

Best William Shakespeare Quotes About Time

“What is past is prologue.” -William Shakespeare
“A man loves the meat in his youth that he cannot endure in his age.” -William Shakespeare
“Defer no time, delays have dangerous ends.” -William Shakespeare
“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
“Time is like a fashionable host That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand, And with his arm outstretch’d, as he would fly, Grasps in the comer.” -William Shakespeare
“There’s a time for all things.” -William Shakespeare
“At Christmas I no more desire a rose Than wish a snow in May’s new-fangled mirth; But like of each thing that in season grows.” -William Shakespeare
“Time’s glory is to command contending kings, To unmask falsehood, and bring truth to light.” -William Shakespeare
“Time shall unfold what plaited cunning hides: Who cover faults, at last shame them derides.” -William Shakespeare
“Nothing ‘gainst Times scythe can make defense.” -William Shakespeare
“Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back Wherein he puts alms for oblivion, A great-sized monster of ingratitudes. Those scraps are good deeds past, which are devour’d As fast as they are made, forgot as soon as done.” -William Shakespeare
“Old Time the clock-setter.” -William Shakespeare
“Time travels in divers paces with divers persons. I’ll tell you who Time ambles withal, who Time trots withal, who Time gallops withal, and who he stands still withal.” -William Shakespeare
“If you can look into the seeds of time, and say which grain will grow and which will not, speak then unto me.” -William Shakespeare
“The weight of this sad time we must obey, Speak what we feel, not what we ought to say. The oldest hath borne most: we that are young Shall never see so much, nor live so long.” -William Shakespeare
“I wasted time, and now doth time waste me; For now hath time made me his numbering clock: My thoughts are minutes; and with sighs they jar Their watches on unto mine eyes, the outward watch, Whereto my finger, like a dial’s point, Is pointing still, in cleansing them from tears. Now sir, the sound that tells what hour it is Are clamorous goans, which strike upon my heart, Which is the bell: so sighs and tears and groans Show minutes, times, and hours.” -William Shakespeare
“What else may hap, to time I will commit.” -William Shakespeare
“Thus we play the fool with the time and the spirits of the wise sit in the clouds and mock us.” -William Shakespeare
“Shorten my days thou canst with sullen sorrow, And pluck nights from me, but not lend a morrow; Thou canst help time to furrow me with age, But stop no wrinkle in his pilgrimage.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes From Romeo And Juliet

“My bounty is as boundless as the sea, My love as deep. The more I give to thee, The more I have, for both are infinite.” -William Shakespeare
“Love is heavy and light, bright and dark, hot and cold, sick and healthy, asleep and awake- its everything except what it is!” -William Shakespeare
“Parting is such sweet sorrow.” -William Shakespeare
“Do thou but close our hands with holy words, Then love-devouring death do what he dare; It is enough I may but call her mine.” -William Shakespeare
“What’s in a name? That which we call a rose By any other name would smell as sweet.” -William Shakespeare
“My only love sprung from my only hate! Too early seen unknown, and known too late! Prodigious birth of love it is to me, That I must love a loathed enemy.” -William Shakespeare
“O, here Will I set up my everlasting rest, And shake the yoke of inauspicious stars
From this world-wearied flesh. Eyes, look your last! Arms, take your last embrace! and, lips, O you The doors of breath, seal with a righteous kiss A dateless bargain to engrossing death!” -William Shakespeare
“Death, that hath sucked the honey of thy breath, Hath had no power yet upon thy beauty.” -William Shakespeare
“From forth the fatal loins of these two foes A pair of star-cross’d lovers take their life Whose misadventured piteous overthrows Do with their death bury their parents’ strife.” -William Shakespeare
“What must be shall be.” -William Shakespeare
“If he be married my grave is like to be my wedding bed.” -William Shakespeare
“O, I am Fortune’s fool!” -William Shakespeare
“See how she leans her cheek upon her hand, O that I were a glove upon that hand that I might touch that cheek!” -William Shakespeare
“You are a lover. Borrow Cupid’s wings And soar with them above a common bound.” -William Shakespeare
“Love goes toward love as schoolboys from their books, But love from love, toward school with heavy looks.” -William Shakespeare
“My bounty is as boundless as the sea, my love as deep. The more I give to thee, the more I have, for both are infinite.” -William Shakespeare
“Love is a smoke raised with the fume of sighs; Being purged, a fire sparkling in lovers’ eyes; Being vexed, a sea nourished with loving tears. What is it else? A madness most discreet, A choking gall, and a preserving sweet.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes From Plays

“Love sought is good, but given unsought is better.” -William Shakespeare
“Love is blind, and lovers cannot see, The pretty follies that themselves commit.” -William Shakespeare
“All that glisters is not gold.” -William Shakespeare
“Some rise by sin, and some by virtue fall.” -William Shakespeare
“The miserable have no other medicine but only hope.” -William Shakespeare
“What’s mine is yours, and what is yours is mine.” -William Shakespeare
“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer’s lease hath all too short a date.” -William Shakespeare
“Misery acquaints a man with strange bedfellows.” -William Shakespeare
“Alas, poor Yorick! I knew him, Horatio, a fellow of infinite jest, of most excellent fancy. He hath bore me on his back a thousand times, and now how abhorr’d in my imagination it is! My gorge rises at it..” -William Shakespeare
“My Oberon! What visions have I seen! Methought I was enamoured of an ass.” -William Shakespeare
“By the pricking of my thumbs, Something wicked this way comes. Double, double toil and trouble; Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.” -William Shakespeare
“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
“If music be the food of love, play on.” -William Shakespeare
“Be not afraid of greatness: some are born great, some achieve greatness and some have greatness thrust upon them.” -William Shakespeare
“I will wear my heart upon my sleeve; For daws to peck at.” -William Shakespeare
“Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears; I come to bury Caesar, not to praise him.” -William Shakespeare
“When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept: Ambition should be made of sterner stuff.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes About Happiness

“But O, how bitter a thing it is to look into happiness through another man’s eyes.” -William Shakespeare
“I had rather have a fool to make me merry than experience to make me sad and to travel for it too!” -William Shakespeare
“Love is not love that alters when it alteration finds.” -William Shakespeare
“What win I, if I gain the thing I seek A dream, a breath, a froth of fleeting joy. Who buys a minute’s mirth to wail a week Or sells eternity to ‘get a toy For one sweet grape who will the vine destroy.” -William Shakespeare
“Where joy most revels, grief doth most lament; Grief joys, joy grieves, on slender accident.” -William Shakespeare
“Twixt two extremes of passion, joy and grief, Burst smilingly.” -William Shakespeare
“As little joy, my lord, as you suppose You should enjoy were you this country’s king, As little joy you may suppose in me That I enjoy, being the Queen thereof.” -William Shakespeare
“I wish you all the joy you can wish.” -William Shakespeare
“O God that men should put an enemy in their mouths to steal away their brains that we should, with joy, pleasance, revel, and applause, transform ourselves into beasts.” -William Shakespeare
“There is tears for his love, joy for his fortune, honor for his valor, and death for his ambition.” -William Shakespeare
“A goodly portly man, i’ faith, and a corpulent; of a cheerful look, a pleasing eye, and a most noble carriage; and, as I think, his age some fifty, or, by’r Lady, inclining to threescore; and now I remember me, his name is Falstaff.” -William Shakespeare
“O love, be moderate, allay thy ecstasy, In measure rain thy joy, scant this excess!” -William Shakespeare
“Heaven, the treasury of everlasting joy.” -William Shakespeare
“Than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy.” -William Shakespeare
“All places that the eye of heaven visits Are to a wise man ports and happy havens. Teach thy necessity to reason thus; There is no virtue like necessity.” -William Shakespeare
“Let’s go hand in hand, not one before another.” -William Shakespeare
“With mirth and laughter let old wrinkles come.” -William Shakespeare
“There is nothing either good or bad but thinking makes it so.” -William Shakespeare
“My life, my joy, my food, my ail the world!” -William Shakespeare
“How much better is it to weep at joy than to joy at weeping.” -William Shakespeare
“This told, I joy; but then no longer glad, I send them back again and straight grow sad.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes About Love

“My bounty is as boundless as the sea, My love as deep. The more I give to thee, The more I have, for both are infinite.” -William Shakespeare
“Love is a smoke raised with the fume of sighs; Being purged, a fire sparkling in lovers’ eyes; Being vexed, a sea nourished with loving tears. What is it else? A madness most discreet, A choking gall, and a preserving sweet.” -William Shakespeare
“If love be blind, love cannot hit the mark.” -William Shakespeare
“Don’t waste your love on somebody, who doesn’t value it.” -William Shakespeare
“Love moderately. Long love doth so. Too swift arrives as tardy as too slow.” -William Shakespeare
“Doubt thou the stars are fire, Doubt the sun doth move, Doubt truth to be a liar but never doubt thy love.” -William Shakespeare
“Suffer love,–a good epithet! I do suffer love indeed, for I love thee against my will.” -William Shakespeare
“Therefore all hearts in love use their own tongues.” -William Shakespeare
“Love me! Why, it must be requited.” -William Shakespeare
“But are you so much in love as your rhymes speak? Neither rhyme nor reason can express how much.” -William Shakespeare
“Sweet, above thought I love thee.” -William Shakespeare
“Love is a spirit all compact of fire.” -William Shakespeare
“A lover’s eyes will gaze an eagle blind; A lover’s ears will hear the lowest sound.” -William Shakespeare
“But love, first learned in a lady’s eyes, Lives not alone immured in the brain, / But, with the motion of all elements, Courses as swift as thought in every power, / And gives to every power a double power, Above their functions and their offices.” -William Shakespeare
“Never durst poet touch a pen to write Until his ink were tempered with Love’s sighs.” -William Shakespeare
“What’s mine is yours, and what is yours is mine.” -William Shakespeare
“I know no ways to mince it in love, but directly to say ‘I love you.’” -William Shakespeare
“Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none.” -William Shakespeare
“No sooner met but they looked, no sooner looked but they loved, no sooner loved, but they sighed, no sooner sighed but they asked one another the reason. No sooner knew the reason but they sought the remedy; And in these degrees have they made a pair of stairs to marriage.” -William Shakespeare
“Her passions are made of nothing but the finest part of pure love.” -William Shakespeare
“I humbly do beseech of your pardon, For too much of loving you.” -William Shakespeare
“Beshrew your eyes, They have o’erlooked me and divided me. One half of me is yours, the other half yours— Mine own, I would say. But if mine, then yours, And so all yours.” -William Shakespeare
“O love, be moderate. Allay thy ecstasy. In measure rein thy joy.” -William Shakespeare
“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate.” -William Shakespeare

Best William Shakespeare Quotes On Life Lessons

“Love sought is good; but given unsought is better.” -William Shakespeare
“One touch of nature makes the whole world kin.” -William Shakespeare
“Life is as tedious as a twice-told tale, vexing the dull ear of a drowsy man.” -William Shakespeare
“Men are April when they woo, December when they wed; maids are May when they are maids, but the sky changes when they are wives.” -William Shakespeare
“Desire of having is the sin of covetousness.” -William Shakespeare
“How sharper than a serpent’s tooth it is to have a thankless child!” -William Shakespeare
“This above all; to thine own self be true; And it must follow, as the night the day, Thou canst not then be false to any man.” -William Shakespeare
“No legacy is so rich as honesty.” -William Shakespeare
“The robbed that smiles steals something from the thief.” -William Shakespeare
“In time we hate that which we often fear.” -William Shakespeare
“Love is not love, which alters when it alteration finds.” -William Shakespeare
“There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.” -William Shakespeare
“When we are born, we cry that we are come to this great stage of fools.” -William Shakespeare
“Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt.” -William Shakespeare
“Let life be short; else shame will be too long.” -William Shakespeare
“Virtue itself ‘scapes not calumnious strokes.” -William Shakespeare
“Virtue is bold, and goodness never fearful.” -William Shakespeare
“It is a wise father that knows his own child.” -William Shakespeare
“There is no darkness, but ignorance.” -William Shakespeare
“The very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream.” -William Shakespeare
“Life every man holds dear; but the dear man holds honor far more precious-dear than life.” -William Shakespeare