Much Ado About Nothing Quotes Test Prep

“I cannot be said to be a flattering man; it must not be denied but I am a plain dealing villain” (I.3.23-25) Don John, This is in the beginning of the play where you first find out Don John is a villain and he is talking to Conrad.
“Well you are a rare parrot teacher” (I.i.114) Benedick, This comes from where Benedick and Beatrice first begin to “flirt” in the beginning of the play, shows they have done this before.
“You always end with a jades trick, I know you of old” (I.i.119) Beatrice, She says this in the same fight as the one “rare parrot teacher.” She is saying you will always end with someone else.
“What, my dear Lady Disdain, are you yet living?”(I.i.99) Benedick, he is saying are you still living? This is in the beginning “flirt session” b/w him and Beatrice.
“Now I am returned and that war thoughts have left their places vacant and in their room come thronging soft and delicate desires all prompting me how fair young Hero is” (I.i.254-257) Claudio, says this when they return from the war, the vacant rooms are in his brain.
“He will hang upon him like a disease…” (I.i.69-71) Beatrice, she is talking about Benedick near the beginning of the play.
“I’d rather be a canker in a hedge than a rose in his grace” (I.iii.21-22) Don John, he is talking to Conrad in Act I talking about his brother, Don Pedro.
“Courtesy itself would convert to disdain if you come in her presence” (I.i.101-102) Beatrice, she is talking to Benedick in the beginning where they have their first little fight.
“We will hold it as a dream until appear itself” (I.ii.17) Leonato, he is talking to Antonio about the overhearing of Claudio talking about his love for Hero.
“He wears his faith as the fashion of his hat; it ever changes with the next block” (I.i.61-62) Beatrice, she is talking about Benedick saying that he is constantly changing.
“There’s her cousin, an she were not possessed with a fury, exceeds her as much in beauty as the first of May doth the last of December” (I.i.157-159) Benedick, he is talking to Claudio about how he intends on marrying Hero, in Act I.
“In faith, hath not the world one man but he will wear his cap with suspicion? Shall I never see a bachelor of threescore again?” (I.i.163-165). Benedick, he is saying to Claudio that he shouldn’t marry Hero, because she will just cheat on him.
“I cannot hide what I am” (I.i.10) Don John, he is saying he will always be a villain when he is talking to Conrad at the beginning.
“Lord, I could never endure a man with a beard on his face! I had rather lie in the woolen” (2.1.25-26) Beatrice, she is talking to Leonato about her standards for men, she doesn’t want a bearded man but also says a man without a beard is basically a gentlewoman.
“Not till God make man of some other metal than earth” (2.1.50) Beatrice, saying to Leonato that she won’t marry until a man is made out of something other than the Earth’s dust.
“Shalt quips and sentences and these paper bullets of a brain awe a man from the career of his humor? No, the world must be peopled!” (2.3.214-216) Benedick, he is saying that he is changed. He says this when he is told that Beatrice loves him so he is saying that his taste changed and he isn’t going to let words stop him from loving her.
“He that hath a beard is more than a youth; he that hath no beard is less than a man” (2.1.29-31) Beatrice, saying that no man will be good enough for her. She is talking to Leonato when she says this.
“They say the lady is truth..and virtuous…and wise but for loving me…for I will be horribly in love with her!” (2.3.204-208). Benedick, he is saying to Claudio that he believes Beatrice when he is told about her love.
“Why he is the prince’s jester, a very dull fool” (2.1.118-119) Beatrice, she’s talking to Benedick in their second little fight at party, but she does not know that she is talking to Benedick because of the mask he is wearing at the party.
“And there shall appear some seeming truth of Hero’s disloyalty…” (2.2.39-41) Don John, he is setting up the plan for Borachio to get with Margaret in Hero’s window. He is talking to Borachio.
“He hath taken infection; hold it up!” (2.3.114) Claudio, he is saying this in the group of guys trying to convince Benedick to love Beatrice
“But til all graces be in one woman, one woman will not come in my grace” (2.3.24-27) Benedick- he is discussing what type of woman he will marry before he finds out Beatrice loves him
“That I was disdainful, and that I had my good wit out of the ‘Hundred Merry Tales'” (2.1.110-111) Beatrice- at the revelry when she is with Benedick but doesn’t know it
“Friendship is constant in all other things / Save in the offices and affairs of love” (2.1.152-153). Claudio- when he thinks that Don Pedro is wooing Hero for himself
“I stood like a man at a mark, with a whole army shooting at me. She speaks poniards and every word stabs” (2.1.215-217 Benedick- after Beatrice tells him what she thinks of him at the revelry
“If her breath were as terrible as her terminations, there were no living near her, she would infect to the North Star” (2.1.217-219) Benedick- after Beatrice tells him what she thinks of him at the revelry
“I will go on the slightest errand now to the Antipodes that you can devise to send me on: I will…fetch you a hair off the great Cham’s beard, do you any embassage to the Pygmies, rather than hold three words’ conference with this harpy” (2.1.230-235) Benedick- to Don Pedro after Beatrice says what she thinks of him at the revelry and he wants to leave Messina
“The count is neither sad, nor sick, nor merry, nor well: but civil count, civil as an orange, and something of that jealous complexion” (2.1.255-257) Beatrice- she is describing Claudio because Claudio thinks Don Pedro wooed Hero for himself
“No my Lord, unless I might have another for working days: you grace is too costly to wear every day” (2.1.286-287) Beatrice- when she turns down Don Pedro
“I do much wonder that one man, seeing how uch another man is a fool when he dedicates his behaviors to love, will…become the argument of his own scorn by falling in love” (2.3.7-11) Benedick- he is talking about love before he finds out that Beatrice loves him
“I had known when there was no music with him but the drum and the fife, and now had he rather hear the tabor and the pipe” (2.3.12-15) Benedick- talking about Claudio and his love, and this is before he finds out Beatrice loves him
“If it prove so, then loving goes by haps; some Cupid kills with arrows, some with traps” (3.1.107-108) Hero- at the end of convincing Beatrice that Benedick loves her
“The pleasant’s angling is to see the fish cut her golden oars the silver stream…” (3.1.26-30) Ursula- convincing Beatrice that Benedick loves her
“Even she. Leonato’s Hero, your Hero, every man’s Hero” (3.2.88-89) Don John- when he is telling Claudio that Hero is unfaithful & that they have proof
“I have the toothache” (3.2.19 Benedick- when Claudio and Don Pedro are mocking him for being so in love
“She is too disdainful; I know her spirits are as coy and wild as haggards of the rock” (3.1.34-36) Hero-when she and Ursula are convincing Beatrice that Benedick loves her
“I think that they touch pitch will be defiled” (3.3.53-56) Dogberry- when he is giving his watchmen instructions before they go out
“A good old man sir, he will be talking. As they say, when the age is in, the wit is out” (3.5.31-32) Dogberry- talking about Verges to Leonato when they go to try and warn Leonato about Borachio
“You shall also make no noise in the street, for the watch to babble and talk is most tolerable and not to be endured” (3.3.31-34) Dogberry- when he is giving his watchmen instructions before they go out for the night
“Marry sir, I would have some confidence with you that discerns you nearly” (3.5.2-3) Benedick- to Leonato when he wants to ask for Leonato’s blessing
“One word, our watch sir hath indeed comprehended to auspicious persons” (3.5.41-43) Dogberry- when him and verges are trying to warn Leonato about Borachio
“Be vigitant, I beseech you” (3.3.84-85) Dogberry- when he sends the watchmen out for the night to police the town
“But truly, for mine own part, if I were as tedious as a king, I could find in my heart to bestow it all of your worship” (3.5.19-21) Dogberry- right before him and verges try to warn Leonato about Borachio
“Dost thou not suspect my place, dost thou not suspect my years, oh that he were here to write me down an ass” (4.2.64-66) Dogberry- after they interrogate Conrad and Borachio & Conrad calls Dogberry an ass
“By noting of the lady, I have marked a thousand blushing apparitions to start into her face, a thousand innocent shames in angel whiteness beat away those blushes” (4.1.164-167) Friar Francis- after Hero is accused and the Friar is explaining why she is innocent
“Why ever was thou lovely in mine eyes?” (4.1.135) Leonato- after Hero is accused and he is angry at his daughter
“Why she oh she is fallen into a pit of ink…and salt too little which my season give to her foul-tainted flesh” (4.1.144-148 Leonato- after Hero is accused and he is angry with his daughter
“for so it falls / That what we prize not to the worth / Whiles we enjoy it; but, being lacked and lost / Why, then we rack the value, then we find / the virtue that possession would not show us while it was ours” (4.1.226-238) Friar Francis- after Hero is accused and this is a part of the Friar’s plan
“Oh God that I were a man, I would eat his heart in the market place” (4.1.312-313) Beatrice- after Hero is accused and after she asks Benedick to kill Claudio
“For did I think thy spirits were stronger than thy shames, myself would on the rearward of reproaches would strike at thy life” (4.1.130-132) Leonato- after Hero is accused and Leonato is angry at his daughter
“I stand dishonoured, that have gone about / To link my dear friend to a common stale” (4.1.64-65). Don Pedro- during Claudio’s accusation of Hero
“I cannot be a man with wishing, therefore I will die a woman with grieving” (4.2.326-327) Beatrice- after Hero is accused and she is angry and after she asks Benedick to kill Claudio
“for, brother, men / can counsel and speak comfort to that grief / Which they themselves not feel, but tasting it, / Their counsel turns to passion, which before / Would give preceptial medicine to rage…Charm agony with air and agony with words” (5.1.21-27) Leonato- he is no longer angry but grieving after the accusation
“I will be flesh and blood…could endure the toothache patiently” (5.1.135-137) Leonato- he is no longer angry at Hero but his in pain and grieving
“I will live in thy heart, die in thy lap, and be buried in thine eyes, and moreover I will go with thee to thy uncles” (5.3.87-88) Benedick- to Beatrice and they are about to go to Leonatos to hear that Hero was falsely accused
“for man is a giddy thing, this is my conclusion” (5.4.109-110) Benedick- after him and Beatrice decide to get married
“I desire nothing but the reward of a villain” (5.1.234-235) Borachio- after he confesses to what he did
“Yet sinned I not but in mistaking” (5.1.266-267) Claudio- after he realizes his mistake against Hero
“We had like to have had our two noses snapped off with two old men without teeth” (5.1.124-125) Claudio- after they run into angry Leonato and Antonio
“You are a villain. I jest not: I will make it good how you dare, with what you dare, and when you dare” (5.1.151-153) Benedick- he is about to challenge Claudio upon request of Beatrice
“What your wisdoms could not discover, these shallow fools have brought to light” (5.1.226-227) Borachio- he is about to confess to his wrong doings
“Thou and I are too wise to woo peaceably” (5.2.62). Benedick- him and Beatrice are talking before they go to hear that Hero was wrongly accused
“Prince, thou art sad: get thee a wife, get thee a wife” (5.2.123) Benedick- he says this to Don Pedro after him and Beatrice & Claudio and Hero have all decided to get married