Shakespeare's England: An Account of the Life & Manners of His Age, Volume 2

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Sir Sidney Lee, Charles Talbut Onions
Clarendon Press, 1916 - 546 pages
 

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Page 139 - A strange fish! Were I in England now, as once I was, and had but this fish painted, not a holiday fool there but would give a piece of silver. There would this monster make a man. Any strange beast there makes a man. When they will not give a doit to relieve a lame beggar, they will lay out ten to see a dead Indian.
Page 234 - And let those that play your clowns, speak no more than is set down for them : for there be of them, that will themselves laugh, to set on some quantity of barren spectators to laugh too ; though, in the mean time, some necessary question of the play be then to be considered: that's villainous; and . shows a most pitiful ambition in the fool that uses it.
Page 221 - O, for a muse of fire, that would ascend The brightest heaven of invention ! A kingdom for a stage, princes to act, And monarchs to behold the swelling scene...
Page 222 - Is it not monstrous that this player here, But in a fiction, in a dream of passion, Could force his soul so to his own conceit That from her working all his visage wann'd ; Tears in his eyes, distraction in 's aspect, A broken voice, and his whole function suiting With forms to his conceit...
Page 225 - Nor do not saw the air too much with your hand, thus ; but use all gently ; for in the very torrent, tempest, and, as I may say, whirlwind of your passion, you must acquire and beget a temperance that may give it smoothness.
Page 28 - HOW oft, when thou, my music, music play'st, Upon that blessed wood whose motion sounds With thy sweet fingers, when thou gently sway'st The wiry concord that mine ear confounds, Do I envy those jacks that nimble leap To kiss the tender inward of thy hand, Whilst my poor lips, which should that harvest reap, At the wood's boldness by thee blushing stand!
Page 137 - Laud be to God ! — even there my life must end. It hath been prophesied to me many years, I should not die but in Jerusalem ; Which vainly I suppos'd the Holy Land : — But, bear me to that chamber ; there I'll lie ; In that Jerusalem shall Harry die.
Page 229 - element,' but the word is over-worn. \Exit. Vio. This fellow is wise enough to play the fool ; And to do that well craves a kind of wit : He must observe their mood on whom he jests, The quality of persons, and the time, And, like the haggard, check at every feather That comes before his eye. This is a practice As full of labour as a wise man's art : . , , For folly that he wisely shows is fit ; But wise men, folly-fall'n, quite taint their wit.
Page 220 - And thus still doing, thus he pass'd along. DUCH. Alas, poor Richard! where rides he the whilst? YORK. As in a theatre, the eyes of men, After a well-grac'd actor leaves the stage, Are idly bent on him that enters next, Thinking his prattle to be tedious : Even so, or with much more contempt, men's eyes Did scowl on Richard ; no man cried, God save him...
Page 24 - Deform'd, unfinish'd, sent before my time Into this breathing world, scarce half made up, And that so lamely and unfashionable That dogs bark at me as I halt by them — Why, I, in this weak piping time of peace, Have no delight to pass away the time, Unless to see my shadow in the sun And descant on mine own deformity.

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