John Bartlett (1820–1905). Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. 1919.
Page 143
| William Shakespeare. (1564–1616) (continued) |
| 1666 |
| One woe doth tread upon another’s heel, So fast they follow. 1 |
| Hamlet. Act iv. Sc. 7. |
| 1667 |
| Nature her custom holds, Let shame say what it will. |
| Hamlet. Act iv. Sc. 7. |
| 1668 |
| 1 Clo. Argal, he that is not guilty of his own death shortens not his own life. 2 Clo. But is this law? 1 Clo. Ay, marry, is ’t; crowner’s quest law. |
| Hamlet. Act v. Sc. 1. |
| 1669 |
| There is no ancient gentlemen but gardeners. |
| Hamlet. Act v. Sc. 1. |
| 1670 |
| Cudgel thy brains no more about it. |
| Hamlet. Act v. Sc. 1. |
| 1671 |
| Has this fellow no feeling of his business? |
| Hamlet. Act v. Sc. 1. |
| 1672 |
| Custom hath made it in him a property of easiness. |
| Hamlet. Act v. Sc. 1. |
| 1673 |
| The hand of little employment hath the daintier sense. |
| Hamlet. Act v. Sc. 1. |
| 1674 |
| A politician,… one that would circumvent God. |
| Hamlet. Act v. Sc. 1. |
| 1675 |
| Why may not that be the skull of a lawyer? Where be his quiddities now, his quillets, his cases, his tenures, and his tricks? |
| Hamlet. Act v. Sc. 1. |
| 1676 |
| One that was a woman, sir; but, rest her soul, she ’s dead. |
| Hamlet. Act v. Sc. 1. |
| 1677 |
| How absolute the knave is! we must speak by the card, or equivocation will undo us. |
| Hamlet. Act v. Sc. 1. |
| 1678 |
| The age is grown so picked that the toe of the peasant comes so near the heel of the courtier, he galls his kibe. |
| Hamlet. Act v. Sc. 1. |
| Note 1. Thus woe succeeds a woe, as wave a wave.—Robert Herrick: Sorrows Succeed. Woes cluster; rare are solitary woes; They love a train, they tread each other’s heel. Edward Young: Night Thoughts, night iii. line 63. And woe succeeds to woe.—Alexander Pope: The Iliad, book xvi. line 139. [back] |