No man is an island, entire of itself; every man is a piece of the continent.

We are all conceived in close prison; in our mothers wombs, we are close prisoners all; when we are born, we are born but to the liberty of the house; prisoners still, though within larger walls; and then all our life is but a going out to the place of execution, to death.

How great love is, presence best trial makes, But absence tries how long this love will be.

The rich have no more of the kingdom of heaven than they have purchased of the poor by their alms.

We can die by it, if not live by love, And if unfit for tombs and hearse Our legend be, it will be fit for verse; And if no peace of chronicle we prove, We'll build in sonnet pretty rooms; As well a well wrought urne becomes The greatest ashes, as half-acre tombs.

If poisonous minerals, and if that tree, Whose fruit threw death on else immortal us, If lecherous goats, if serpents envious Cannot be damned; alas; why should I be?

Chastity is not chastity in an old man, but a disability to be unchaste.