Thomas Dekker (writer)

"A wise man poor Is like a sacred book that’s never read,— To himself he lives, and to all else seems dead. This age thinks better of a gilded fool Than of a threadbare saint in wisdom’s school."

"And though mine arm should conquer twenty worlds, There ’s a lean fellow beats all conquerors."

"To add to golden numbers golden numbers."

"Honest labour bears a lovely face."

"The best of men That e’er wore earth about him was a sufferer; A soft, meek, patient, humble, tranquil spirit, The first true gentleman that ever breathed."

"I was ne’er so thrummed since I was a gentleman."

"This principle is old, but true as fate,— Kings may love treason, but the traitor hate."

"We are ne’er like angels till our passion dies."

"Turn over a new leaf."

"Do but consider what an excellent thing sleep is: it is so inestimable a jewel that, if a tyrant would give his crown for an hour's slumber, it cannot be bought; of so beautiful a shape is it, that though a man lie with an Empress, his heart cannot beat quite till he leaves her embracements to be at rest with the other; yea, so greatly indebted are we to this kinsman of death, that we owe the better tributary, half of our life to him: and there is good cause why we should do so: for sleep is that golden chain that ties health and our bodies together. Who complains of want? of wounds? of cares? of great men's oppressions? of captivity? whilst he sleepeth? Beggars in their beds take as much pleasure as kings: can we therefore surfeit on this delicate Ambrosia? Can we drink too much of that whereof to taste too little tumbles us into a churchyard, and to use it but indifferently throws us into Bedlam? No, no, look upon Endymion, the moon's minion, who slept three score and fifteen years, and was not a hair the worse for it."

"Art thou poor, yet hast thou golden slumbers? O sweet content! Art thou rich, yet is thy mind perplex'd? O punishment!"

"ONAELIA: One step to human bliss is sweet revenge."

"ONAELIA:You are like common beadles, apt to lash Almost to death poor wretches not worth striking, But fawn with slavish flattery on damned vices So great men act them. You clap hands at those, Where the true poet indeed doth scorn to gild A gaudy tomb with glory of his verse, Which coffins stinking carrion."

"ONAELIA: What sort of poets are there? POET: Two sorts lady: The great poets and the small poets. ONAELIA: Great and small! Which do you call the great? The fat ones?"

"ALANZO: Wrongs, like great whirlwinds, Shake highest battlements. Few for heaven would care, Should they be ever happy."

"KING: I am full of thoughts, A thousand wheels toss my incertain fears, There is a storm in my hot boiling brains, Which rises without wind. A horrid one."

"BALTHAZAR: I have a private coat for Italian stilettos, I can be treacherous with the Walloon, drunk with the Dutch, a chimney-sweeper with the Irish, a gentleman with the Welsh and true arrant thief with the English. What then is my country to me?"

"BALTHAZAR: Subjects may stumble, when kings walk astray. Thine acts shall be a new Apocrypha."

"BALTHAZAR: Sin is a raven croaking her own fall."

"QUEEN: But Hymen's torch, held downward, shall drop out, And for it, the mad Furies swing their brands About the bride-chamber."