# 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]

Parolles

137

There's little can be said in 't; 'tis against the
rule of nature. To speak on the part of virginity,
is to accuse your mothers; which is most infallible
disobedience. He that hangs himself is a virgin:
virginity murders itself and should be buried in
highways out of all sanctified limit, as a desperate
offendress against nature. Virginity breeds mites,
much like a cheese; consumes itself to the very
paring, and so dies with feeding his own stomach.
Besides, virginity is peevish, proud, idle, made of
self-love, which is the most inhibited sin in the
canon. Keep it not; you cannot choose but loose
by't: out with 't! within ten year it will make
itself ten, which is a goodly increase; and the
principal itself not much the worse: away with 't!

2

All's Well That Ends Well
[I, 3]

Clown

399

One good woman in ten, madam; which is a purifying
o' the song: would God would serve the world so all
the year! we'ld find no fault with the tithe-woman,
if I were the parson. One in ten, quoth a'! An we
might have a good woman born but one every blazing
star, or at an earthquake, 'twould mend the lottery
well: a man may draw his heart out, ere a' pluck
one.

3

Antony and Cleopatra
[I, 5]

Alexas

580

Like to the time o' the year between the extremes
Of hot and cold, he was nor sad nor merry.

4

Antony and Cleopatra
[III, 2]

Domitius Enobarus

1663

[Aside to AGRIPPA] That year, indeed, he was
troubled with a rheum;
What willingly he did confound he wail'd,
Believe't, till I wept too.

5

As You Like It
[III, 2]

Rosalind

1408

Marry, he trots hard with a young maid between the
contract of her marriage and the day it is solemniz'd; if the
interim be but a se'nnight, Time's pace is so hard that it seems
the length of seven year.

6

As You Like It
[III, 5]

Phebe

1718

Sweet youth, I pray you chide a year together;
I had rather hear you chide than this man woo.

7

As You Like It
[IV, 1]

Rosalind

1876

No, faith, die by attorney. The poor world is almost six
thousand years old, and in all this time there was not any man
died in his own person, videlicet, in a love-cause. Troilus had
his brains dash'd out with a Grecian club; yet he did what he
could to die before, and he is one of the patterns of love.
Leander, he would have liv'd many a fair year, though Hero had
turn'd nun, if it had not been for a hot midsummer night; for,
good youth, he went but forth to wash him in the Hellespont, and,
being taken with the cramp, was drown'd; and the foolish
chroniclers of that age found it was- Hero of Sestos. But these
are all lies: men have died from time to time, and worms have
eaten them, but not for love.

8

As You Like It
[V, 2]

Rosalind

2293

I will weary you, then, no longer with idle talking. Know
of me then- for now I speak to some purpose- that I know you are
a gentleman of good conceit. I speak not this that you should
bear a good opinion of my knowledge, insomuch I say I know you
are; neither do I labour for a greater esteem than may in some
little measure draw a belief from you, to do yourself good, and
not to grace me. Believe then, if you please, that I can do
strange things. I have, since I was three year old, convers'd
with a magician, most profound in his art and yet not damnable.
If you do love Rosalind so near the heart as your gesture cries
it out, when your brother marries Aliena shall you marry her. I
know into what straits of fortune she is driven; and it is not
impossible to me, if it appear not inconvenient to you, to set
her before your eyes to-morrow, human as she is, and without any
danger.

9

Comedy of Errors
[IV, 1]

Dromio of Ephesus

973

I buy a thousand pound a year: I buy a rope.

10

Hamlet
[III, 2]

Hamlet

2009

So long? Nay then, let the devil wear black, for I'll have a
suit of sables. O heavens! die two months ago, and not forgotten
yet? Then there's hope a great man's memory may outlive his life
half a year. But, by'r Lady, he must build churches then; or else
shall he suffer not thinking on, with the hobby-horse, whose
epitaph is 'For O, for O, the hobby-horse is forgot!'
[Hautboys play. The dumb show enters.]
Enter a King and a Queen very lovingly; the Queen embracing
him and he her. She kneels, and makes show of protestation
unto him. He takes her up, and declines his head upon her
neck. He lays him down upon a bank of flowers. She, seeing
him asleep, leaves him. Anon comes in a fellow, takes off his
crown, kisses it, pours poison in the sleeper's ears, and
leaves him. The Queen returns, finds the King dead, and makes
passionate action. The Poisoner with some three or four Mutes,
comes in again, seem to condole with her. The dead body is
carried away. The Poisoner wooes the Queen with gifts; she
seems harsh and unwilling awhile, but in the end accepts
his love.

11

Hamlet
[V, 1]

First Clown

3478

Of all the days i' th' year, I came to't that day that our
last king Hamlet overcame Fortinbras.

12

Hamlet
[V, 1]

First Clown

3498

Faith, if 'a be not rotten before 'a die (as we have many
pocky corses now-a-days that will scarce hold the laying in, I
will last you some eight year or nine year. A tanner will last
you nine year.

13

Henry IV, Part I
[I, 2]

Henry V

298

I know you all, and will awhile uphold
The unyoked humour of your idleness:
Yet herein will I imitate the sun,
Who doth permit the base contagious clouds
To smother up his beauty from the world,
That, when he please again to be himself,
Being wanted, he may be more wonder'd at,
By breaking through the foul and ugly mists
Of vapours that did seem to strangle him.
If all the year were playing holidays,
To sport would be as tedious as to work;
But when they seldom come, they wish'd for come,
And nothing pleaseth but rare accidents.
So, when this loose behavior I throw off
And pay the debt I never promised,
By how much better than my word I am,
By so much shall I falsify men's hopes;
And like bright metal on a sullen ground,
My reformation, glittering o'er my fault,
Shall show more goodly and attract more eyes
Than that which hath no foil to set it off.
I'll so offend, to make offence a skill;
Redeeming time when men think least I will.

14

Henry IV, Part I
[II, 4]

Henry V

1031

Five year! by'r lady, a long lease for the clinking
of pewter. But, Francis, darest thou be so valiant
as to play the coward with thy indenture and show it
a fair pair of heels and run from it?

15

Henry IV, Part I
[II, 4]

Lord Bardolph

1294

Yea, and to tickle our noses with spear-grass to
make them bleed, and then to beslubber our garments
with it and swear it was the blood of true men. I
did that I did not this seven year before, I blushed
to hear his monstrous devices.

16

Henry IV, Part I
[IV, 1]

Earl of Douglas

2363

Talk not of dying: I am out of fear
Of death or death's hand for this one-half year.

17

Henry IV, Part II
[Prologue, 1]

Rumour

2

Open your ears; for which of you will stop
The vent of hearing when loud Rumour speaks?
I, from the orient to the drooping west,
Making the wind my post-horse, still unfold
The acts commenced on this ball of earth.
Upon my tongues continual slanders ride,
The which in every language I pronounce,
Stuffing the ears of men with false reports.
I speak of peace while covert emnity,
Under the smile of safety, wounds the world;
And who but Rumour, who but only I,
Make fearful musters and prepar'd defence,
Whiles the big year, swoln with some other grief,
Is thought with child by the stern tyrant war,
And no such matter? Rumour is a pipe
Blown by surmises, jealousies, conjectures,
And of so easy and so plain a stop
That the blunt monster with uncounted heads,
The still-discordant wav'ring multitude,
Can play upon it. But what need I thus
My well-known body to anatomize
Among my household? Why is Rumour here?
I run before King Harry's victory,
Who, in a bloody field by Shrewsbury,
Hath beaten down young Hotspur and his troops,
Quenching the flame of bold rebellion
Even with the rebels' blood. But what mean I
To speak so true at first? My office is
To noise abroad that Harry Monmouth fell
Under the wrath of noble Hotspur's sword,
And that the King before the Douglas' rage
Stoop'd his anointed head as low as death.
This have I rumour'd through the peasant towns
Between that royal field of Shrewsbury
And this worm-eaten hold of ragged stone,
Where Hotspur's father, old Northumberland,
Lies crafty-sick. The posts come tiring on,
And not a man of them brings other news
Than they have learnt of me. From Rumour's tongues
They bring smooth comforts false, worse than true wrongs.

18

Henry IV, Part II
[II, 4]

Henry V

1553

Saturn and Venus this year in conjunction! What says
almanac to that?

19

Henry IV, Part II
[III, 2]

Silence

2064

That's fifty-five year ago.

20

Henry IV, Part II
[III, 2]

Francis Feeble

2093

By my troth, I care not; a man can die but once; we owe
a death. I'll ne'er bear a base mind. An't be my destiny, so;
an't be not, so. No man's too good to serve 's Prince; and,
it go which way it will, he that dies this year is quit for
next.