William Shakespeare on Time
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“So many hours must I take my rest; So many hours must I contemplate.”
“Time is the old justice that examines all such offenders, and let Time try.”
“The end crowns all, And that old common arbitrator, Time, Will one day end it.”
“We should hold day with the Antipodes, If you would walk in absence of the sun.”
“Time doth transfix the flourish set on youth And delves the parallels in beauty's brow.”
“Time's glory is to calm contending kings, To unmask falsehood, and bring truth to light.”
“Yet, do thy worst, old Time; despite thy wrong, My love shall in my verse ever live young.”
“Time shall unfold what plighted cunning hides; Who cover faults, at last shame them derides.”
“If you can look into the seeds of time, And say which grain will grow and which will not; Speak then to me.”
“Time's the king of men, He's both their parent, and he is their grave, And gives them what he will, not what they crave.”
“And, looking on it with lack-lustre eye, Says very wisely, "It is ten o'clock: Thus we may see," quoth he, "how the world wags."”
“Beauty, wit, High birth, vigour of bone, desert in service, Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all To envious and calumniating time.”
“Minutes, hours, days, months, and years, Pass'd over to the end they were created, Would bring white hairs unto a quiet grave. Ah, what a life were this!”
“Let's take the instant by the forward top; For we are old, and on our quick'st decrees The inaudible and noiseless foot of Time Steals ere we can effect them.”
“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.”
“Time is like a fashionable host That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand, And with his arms outstretch'd, as he would fly Grasps in the comer: welcome ever smiles.”
“Make use of time, let not advantage slip; Beauty within itself should not be wasted: Fair flowers that are not gather'd in their prime Rot and consume themselves in little time.”
“See the minutes, how they run, How many make the hour full complete; How many hours bring about the day; How many days will finish up the year; How many years a mortal man may live.”
“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.”
“Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted color off, And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark. Do not forever with thy vailèd lids Seek for thy noble father in the dust: Thou know'st tis common; all that lives must die, Passing through nature to eternity.”
“O, how shall summer's honey breath hold out Against the wreckful siege of battering days, When rocks impregnable are not so stout, Nor gates of steel so strong, but Time decays? O fearful meditation! where, alack, Shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest lie hid? Or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back? Or who his spoil of beauty can forbid?”