| I had rather lose the battle than that sister should loosen him and me | Goneril |
| To both these sisters have I sworn my love; each jealous of the other, as the sturng are of adder. Which of them shall I take? Both? One? Or neither? Neither can be enjoyed, if both remain alive: to take the widow exasperates, makes mad her sister Goneril; and hardly shall I carry out my side, her husband being alive. | Edmund |
| Before you fight the battle, ope this letter. If you have victory, let the trumpet sound for him that brought it: wretched though I seem, I can produce a champion that will prove what is avouched there. If you miscarry, your business of the world hath so an end and machination ceases. Fortune love you. | Edgar |
| A plague upon you, murderers, traitors all! | Lear |
| I have seen the day, with my good biting falchion and these same crosses spoil me. Who are you? Mine eyes are not o’ th’ best: I’ll tell you straight | Lear |
| The weight of this sad time we must obey, speak what we feel, not what we ought to say, the oldest hath borne the most: we that are young shall never see so much, nor live so long | Edgar |
| And my poor fool is hanged; no, no, no life | Lear |
| Why should a dog, a horse, a rat have life and thou no breath at all? Thou’lt come no more, Never, never, never, never, never… Do you see this? Look on her. Look, her lips, look there, look there. | Lear |
| There is a cliff whose high and bending head looks fearfully in the confined deep: bring me to the very brim of it, and I’ll repair the misery thou dost bear with something rich about me: from that place I shall no leading need | Gloucester |
| ”Tis known before. Our preparation stands in expectation of them. O dear father, it is thy business that I go about; therefore great France my mourning and importuned tears hath pitied. No blown ambition doth our arms incite, but love, dear love, and our aged father’s right: soon I may hear and see him! | Cordelia |
| Milk-liveried man! That bears a cheek for blows, a head for wrongs; who hast not in thy brows and eye for discerning thine honor from thy suffering; that not know’st fools do those villains pity who are punished ere they have done their mischief. Where’s thy drum? France spreads his banners in our noiseless land, with plumed helm they state begins to threat, whilst thou, a moral fool, sits still and cries “Alack, why does he so?” | Goneril |
| I have no way and therefore want no eyes I stumbled when I saw. Full oft ’tis seen, our means secure us, and our mere defects prove our commodities. Oh, dear son Edgar, the food of thy abused father’s wrath! Might I but live to see thee in my touch, I’d say I had eyes again! | Gloucester |
| You do me wrong to take me o’ th’ grave: THou art a soul in bliss; but I am bound upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears do scald like molten lead | Lear |
| What, art mad? A man may see how this world goes with no eyes. Look with thine ears: see how justice rails upon yond simple thief. Hark, in thine ear: change places, and, handy-dandy, which is the justice, which is the thief? Robes and furred gowns hide all. Plate sin with gold, and the strong lance of justice hurtles breaks; get thee glass eyes, and, like a scurvy politician, seem to see the things thou dost not. Now, now, now, now. Pull off my boots: harder, harder: so. | Lear |
| Thou call’st on him that hates thee. It was he who made the overture of thy treasons to us; who is too good to pity thee. | Regan |
| Pluck out his eyes! | Goneril |
| O my follies! Then Edgar was abuse. Kind gods, forgive me that, and prosper him. | Gloucester |
| Lest it see more, prevent it. Out, vile jelly. Where is thy luster now? | Cornwall |
| Blow, winds, and crack your cheeks. Rage, blow! Your cataracts and hurricanoes, spout till you have drenched our steeples, drowned thy cocks. You sulph’rous and thought-executing fires, aunt couriers of oak-cleaving thunderbolts, singe my white head. And thoug, all-shaking thunder, strike flat the rotundity o’ th’ world, crack nature’s molds, all terminals spill at once, that makes ingrateful man. | Lear |
| Because I would not see thy cruel nails pluck out his poor old eyes; nor they fierce sister in his anointed flesh rash boarish fangs… | Gloucester |
| Yet, poor old heart, he holp the heavens to rain If wolves had at thy gate howled that’d earn time, they shouldst have said, “Good porter, turn the key.” | Gloucester |
| What need one? | Regan |
| A knave, a rascal, an eater of broken meats… one whom I will beat into clamorous whining if thou deniest the least syllable of thy addition. | Kent |
| Hear me, my lord. What need you five-and-twenty? Ten? Or five? To follow in a house where twice so many have a command to tend you? | Goneril |
| I hear my father coming. Pardon me: In cunning I must draw my sword upon you. Draw, seem to defend yourself; now quit you well. Yield! Come before my father! Light ho, here! … | Edmund |
| O reason not the need! | Lear |
| Winter’s not gone yet, if the wild geese fly that way. Fathers that wear rags do make their children blind, but fathers that bear bags shall see their children kind… | Fool |
| Allow not nature more than nature needs, man’s life is cheap as beast’s. Thou art a lady: if only to go warm were gorgeous, why, nature needs not what thou gorgeous wear’st, which scarcely keeps thee warm… I will have such revenges on you both… | Lear |
| Good my lord you have be got me, bred me, loved me. I return those duties back as are right fit, obey you, love you, and most honor you. Why have my sisters husbands, if they say they love you all? | Cordelia |
| Nothing will come of nothing. Speak again | Lear |
| Meantime, we shall express our darker purpose. Give me the map there. Know that we have divided in our three kingdom; and ’tis our fast intent to shake all cares and business from our age, conferring them on younger strengths, while we unburdened crawl toward death | Lear |
| Sir, I love you more than word can wield the matter; dearer than eyesight, space, and liberty; beyond wha can be valued, rich or rare; no less than life, with grace, health, beauty, honor; as much as child e’er loved, or father found; a love that makes breath poor, and speech unable: beyond all manner of so much I love you. | Goneril |
| Unhappy that I am, I cannot leave my heart into my mouth, I love your Majesty according to my bond, no more nor less | Cordelia |
| I made of that self meddle as my sister and prize me at her worth. In my true heart I find she names my very deed of love; only she comes too short, that I profess myself an enemy to all other joys which the most precious square of sense professes, and find I am alone felicitate in your dear Highness’ love. | Regan |
| See better, Lear, and let me remain the true blank of thine eye. | Kent |
| I beseech you, sir, pardon me. It is a letter from my brother that I have not all o’er read; and for so much as I have peruse, I find it not fit for your o’erlooking | Edmund |
| She will taste as like this as a crab does to a crab. Thou canst tell why one’s nose stands i’ th’ middle on’s face? … Why, to keep one’s eyes on either side’s nose, that what a man cannot smell out, he may spy into. | Fool |
| Some villain hath done me wrong | Edgar |
| The jewels of our father, with wash’d eyes Cordelia leaves you | Cordelia |
| Thou shouldst not have been old till thou hadst been wise | Fool |
| My old heart is crack’d, is crack’d | Gloucester |
| I am a man more sinn’d against than sinning | Lear |
| The worst is not so long as we can say ‘this is the worst’ | Edgar |
| I am bound upon a wheel of fire, that mine own tears do scald like molten lead | Lear |
King Lear Quotes Test
July 2, 2019