Quotes & Sayings About Ambition Shakespeare

Flesh and blood,
You, brother mine, that entertain'd ambition,
Expell'd remorse and nature, who, with Sebastian-
Whose inward pinches therefore are most strong-
Would here have kill'd your king, I do forgive thee,
Unnatural though thou art. — William Shakespeare

I have no spur
To prick the sides of my intent, but only
Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself
And falls on the other. — William Shakespeare

Virtue is chok'd with foul ambition — William Shakespeare

Ambition, the soldier's virtue. — William Shakespeare

I'm not in the Shakespeare stakes. I have no ambition. — Ian Fleming

If one considers the characters in the plays of Shakespeare, in the poems of the Roman poet Ovid, in the Greek tragedies of Sophocles and Euripides, and even in the hieroglyphics of ancient Egypt, they can be recognized in our daily lives. Their actions were driven by the same motives as ours - ambition, love, pride, fear, anger, sympathy, and fun. — John H. Vanston

Ambition, the soldier's virtue, rather makes choice of loss, than gain which darkens him. — William Shakespeare

But 'tis common proof, that lowliness is young ambition's ladder, whereto the climber-upward turns his face; but when he once attains the upmost round, he then turns his back, looks in the clouds, scorning the vase defrees by which he did ascend. — William Shakespeare

And let those that play your clowns speak no more than is set down for them: for there be of them that will themselves laugh, to set on some quantity of barren spectators to laugh too, though in the meantime some necessary question of the play be then to be considered: that's villanous and shows a most pitiful ambition in the fool that uses it. — William Shakespeare

That tears shall drown the wind. I have no spur To prick the sides of my intent, but only Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself And falls on th' other. — William Shakespeare

Tales of power and ambition and intrigue and betrayal and desire - when you're telling those in a big way, you automatically want to go to Shakespeare. — Beau Willimon

Farewell the tranquil mind! farewell content!
Farewell the plumed troops, and the big wars
That make ambition virtue. — William Shakespeare

Farewell the plumed troop, and the big wars
That make ambition virtue! O, farewell!
Farewell the neighing steed and the shrill trump,
The spirit-stirring drum, th' ear-piercing fife,
The royal banner, and all quality,
Pride, pomp, and circumstance of glorious war! — William Shakespeare

Ambition should be made from sterner stuff. — William Shakespeare

Thriftless ambition, that wilt ravin up Thine own life's means! — William Shakespeare

Verily, I swear, 'tis better to be lowly born, and range with humble livers in content, than to be perk'd up in a glistering grief, and wear a golden sorrow. — William Shakespeare

Love and meekness, lord,
Become a churchman better than ambition:
Win straying souls with modesty again,
Cast none away. — William Shakespeare

Robert Burton's The Anatomy of Melancholy (1621) was a profoundly important analysis of human states of mind - a kind of early philosophical/ psychological study. He sees 'melancholy' as part of the human condition, especially love melancholy and religious melancholy. His concerns are remarkably close to those which Shakespeare explores in his plays. Ambition, for example, Burton describes as 'a proud covetousness or a dry thirst of Honour, a great torture of the mind, composed of envy, pride and covetousness, a gallant madness' - words which could well be applied to Macbeth. — Ronald Carter

Ill-weaved ambition, how much art thou shrunk! When that this body did contain a spirit a kingdom for it was to small a bound. But now two paces of the vilest earth are room enough — William Shakespeare

Dreams, indeed, are ambition; for the very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream. And I hold ambition of so airy and light a quality that it is but a shadow's shadow. — William Shakespeare

Vaulting ambition, which o'erleaps itself And falls on the other side — William Shakespeare

Ambition should be made of sterner stuff. — William Shakespeare

I had always wanted to retell a Shakespeare play. It was an ambition from college days. But in order to be able to do it ... the circumstances in my life didn't come together for a long time. — Chris Adrian

Which dreams indeed are ambition;for the very substance of the ambitious is merely the shadow of a dream. A dream itself is but a shadow. — William Shakespeare

Tis a common proof That lowliness is young ambition's ladder - WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE, Julius Caesar — Liaquat Ahamed

How all occasions do inform against me,
And spur my dull revenge! What is a man,
If his chief good and market of his time
Be but to sleep and feed? a beast, no more.
Sure, he that made us with such large discourse,
Looking before and after, gave us not
That capability and god-like reason
To fust in us unused. Now, whether it be
Bestial oblivion, or some craven scruple
Of thinking too precisely on the event,
A thought which, quarter'd, hath but one part wisdom
And ever three parts coward, I do not know
Why yet I live to say 'This thing's to do;'
Sith I have cause and will and strength and means
To do't. Examples gross as earth exhort me:
Witness this army of such mass and charge
Led by a delicate and tender prince,
Whose spirit with divine ambition puff'd — William Shakespeare

Ambition's debt is paid. — William Shakespeare

Shakespeare was an intellectual ocean, whose waves touched all the shores of thought; within which were all the tides and waves of destiny and will; over which swept all the storms of fate, ambition and revenge; upon which fell the gloom and darkness of despair and death and all the sunlight of content and love, and within which was the inverted sky lit with the eternal stars
an intellectual ocean
toward which all rivers ran, and from which now the isles and continents of thought receive their dew and rain. — Robert Green Ingersoll

Pride went before, ambition follows him. — William Shakespeare

The very substance of ambition is merely the shadow of a dream. — William Shakespeare

The histories and tragedies of Shakespeare that Lincoln loved most dealt with themes that would resonate to a president in the midst of civil war: political intrigue, the burdens of power, the nature of ambition, the relationship of leaders to those they governed. The plays illuminated with stark beauty the dire consequences of civil strife, the evils wrought by jealousy and disloyalty, the emotions evoked by the death of a child, the sundering of family ties or love of country. — Doris Kearns Goodwin

Who soars too near the sun, with golden wings, melts them. — William Shakespeare

I thrice presented him a kingly crown. Which he did thrice refuse. Was this ambition? — William Shakespeare

If I could mimic the dynamic of any Shakespearean marriage, I'd choose to mimic the Macbeths - before the murder, ruthless ambition, and torturous descents into madness and death, that is. — Jillian Keenan

I charge thee, fling away ambition. By that sin fell the angels. — William Shakespeare

When that the poor have cried, Caesar hath wept: Ambition should be made of sterner stuff: Yet Brutus says he was ambitious; And Brutus is an honourable man. — William Shakespeare