William Shakespeare

The lunatic, the lover, and the poet Are of imagination all compact: One sees more devils than vast hell can read more

The lunatic, the lover, and the poet Are of imagination all compact: One sees more devils than vast hell can hold, That is, the madman: the lover, all as frantic, Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt: The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling, Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven; And as imagination bodies forth The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing A local habitation and a name. Such tricks hath strong imagination, That if it would but apprehend some joy, It comprehends some bringer of that joy; Or in the night, imagining some fear, How easy is a bush supposed a bear! -A Midsummer Night's Dream. Act v. Sc. 1.

Under the greenwood tree Who loves to lie with me. -As You Like It. Act ii. Sc. 5.

Under the greenwood tree Who loves to lie with me. -As You Like It. Act ii. Sc. 5.

I heard a bird so sing,
Whose music, to my thinking, pleased the king.

I heard a bird so sing,
Whose music, to my thinking, pleased the king.

When workmen strive to do better than well,
They do confound their skill in covetousness,
And oftentimes read more

When workmen strive to do better than well,
They do confound their skill in covetousness,
And oftentimes excusing of a fault
Doth make the fault the worse by the excuse,
As patches set upon a little breach
Discredit more in hiding of the fault
Than did the fault before it was so patched.

For violent fires soon burn out themselves.

For violent fires soon burn out themselves.