A high hope for a low heaven: God grant us patience!

My nature is subdued to what it works in, like the dyer's hand.

There is no vice so simple but assumes some mark of virtue on his outward parts.

So our virtues lie in the interpretation of the time

For in my youth I never did apply Hot and rebellious liquors in my blood.

The quality of mercy is not strain'd, It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven Upon the place beneath: it is twice blest; It blesseth him that gives and him that takes: 'Tis mightiest in the mightiest: it becomes The throned monarch better than his crown; His sceptre shows the force of temporal power, The attribute to awe and majesty, Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings; But mercy is above this sceptred sway; It is enthroned in the hearts of kings, It is an attribute to God himself; And earthly power doth then show likest God's When mercy seasons justice.

There is some soul of goodness in things evil, Would men observingly distill it out.