Laudator Temporis Acti

Excerpts from Shakespeare, As You Like It:

1.2.92:

...news-crammed...

1.3.12 (Rosalind):

O, how full of briers is this working-day world!

2.1.12-14 (Duke Senior):

Sweet are the uses of adversity,
Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head.

2.3.15-16 (Adam):

O, what a world is this, when what is comely
Envenoms him that bears it!

2.3.51-57 (Adam):

Though I look old, yet I am strong and lusty;
For in my youth I never did apply
Hot and rebellious liquors in my blood,
Nor did not with unbashful forehead woo
The means of weakness and debility;
Therefore my age is as a lusty winter,
Frosty, but kindly.

2.4.16-17 (Touchstone):

When I was at home I was in a better place; but travellers must be content.

2.5.12-13 (Jaques):

I can suck melancholy out of a song, as a weasel sucks eggs.

2.6.5 (Orlando):

Live a little; comfort a little; cheer thyself a little.

2.7.60-64 (Jaques):

Give me leave
To speak my mind, and I will through and through
Cleanse the foul body of th' infected world,
If they will patiently receive my medicine.

2.7.204-208 (Duke Senior, add to collection about children resembling fathers):

If that you were the good Sir Rowland's son,
As you have whisper'd faithfully you were,
And as mine eye doth his effigies witness
Most truly limn'd and living in your face,
Be truly welcome hither.

3.2.72-76 (Corin):

Sir, I am a true labourer: I earn that I eat, get that I wear; owe no man hate, envy no man's happiness; glad of other men's good, content with my harm; and the greatest of my pride is to see my ewes graze and my lambs suck.

3.2.191-193 (Celia):

O wonderful, wonderful, most wonderful wonderful, and yet again wonderful, and after that, out of all whooping!

3.2.248-249 (Rosalind):

Do you not know I am a woman? When I think, I must speak.

3.2.275-276 (Jaques):

Will you sit down with me? and we two will rail against our mistress the world, and all our misery.

3.5.62-63 (Rosalind disguised):

Down on your knees,
And thank heaven, fasting, for a good man's love.

4.1.3-4 (Rosalind disguised and Jaques):

Ros. They say you are a melancholy fellow.
Jaq. I am so; I do love it better than laughing.

4.1.10-19 (Jaques):

I have neither the scholar's melancholy, which is emulation; nor the musician's, which is fantastical; nor the courtier's, which is proud; nor the soldier's, which is ambitious; nor the lawyer's, which is politic; nor the lady's, which is nice; nor the lover's, which is all these; but it is a melancholy of mine own, compounded of many simples, extracted from many objects, and, indeed, the sundry contemplation of my travels; in which my often rumination wraps me in a most humorous sadness.

4.1.101-102 (Rosalind):

Men have died from time to time, and worms have eaten them, but not for love.

5.4.83-85 (Touchstone):

I did dislike the cut of a certain courtier's beard; he sent me word, if I said his beard was not cut well, he was in the mind it was. This is call'd the Retort Courteous. If I sent him word again it was not well cut, he would send me word he cut it to please himself. This is call'd the Quip Modest. If again it was not well cut, he disabled my judgment. This is call'd the Reply Churlish. If again it was not well cut, he would answer I spake not true. This is call'd the Reproof Valiant. If again it was not well cut, he would say I lie. This is call'd the Countercheck Quarrelsome. And so to the Lie Circumstantial and the Lie Direct.

5.4.105-106 (Touchstone):

Your If is the only peace-maker; much virtue in If.