LEAVING CERT ENGLISH - key quotes

2026 shakespearean, stlt, sive, shawshank

fair is foul and foul is fair, hover through fog and filthy air

the witches, 1.1

a for brave M - well he deserves that name - disdaining Fortune, with his brandished steel which smoked with bloody execution, like Valour’s minion carved out his passage

captain, 1.2

so foul and fair a day I have not seen

M, 1.3

wha were these, so withered, and so wild in their attre, that look not like th’inhabitants ‘ th’ earth, and yet are on’t?

banquo, 1.3

but t’is strange; and oftentimes, to win us our harm, the instruments of darkness tell us truths, win us with honest trifles, to betray’s in deepest consequence

banquo, 1.3

there’s no art to find the mind’s construction in the face

duncan, 1.4

Glamis thou art, and Cawdor, and shalt be what though art promised; yet i do fear thy nature, it is too full o’th’ milk of human kindness to catch the nearest way

LM, 1.5

come, you spirits that feed on mortal thoughts, unsex me here, and fill me from the crown to the toe, top-full of direst cruelty

LM, 1.5

look like th’innocent flower, but be the serpent under’t

LM, 1.5

i have no spur to prick the sides of my intent, but only vaulting ambition, which o’erleaps itself and falls on th’other -

M, 1.7

i have given suck, and I know how tender t’is to love the babe that milks me; I would, while it was smiling in my face, have plucked my nipple from hs boneless gums and dashed the brains out, had I so sworn as you have done this

LM, 1.7

is this a dagger which i see before me, the handle toward my hand? come, let me clutch thee. i have thee not, and yet i see thee still

M, 2.1

methought i heard a voice cry ‘Sleep no more; M does murder sleep, the innocent sleep, sleep that knits up the ravelled sleeve of care

M, 2.2

a little water clears us of this deed. how easy it is then!

LM, 2.2

had i but died an hour before this chance, i had lived a blesséd time; for from this instant there’s nothing serious in mortality - all is but toys: renown and grace is dead

M, 2.3

for Banquo’s issues have I filed my mind, for them the gracious Duncan have I murdered

M, 3.1

nought’s had, all’s spent, where our desire is got without content; ‘tis safer to be that which we destroy, than by destruction dwell in doubtful joy

LM, 3.2

things without all remedy should be without regard - what’s done, is done

LM, 3.2

i am in blood stepped in so far that, should i wade no more, returning were as tedious as go o’er

M, 3.4

by the pricking of my thumb, something wicked this way comes

second witch, 4.1

be bloody, bold, and resolute: laugh to scorn the power of man; for none of woman born shall harm M

second apparition, 4.1

M shall never vanquished be, until Great Birnam wood to high Dunsinan Hill shall come against him

third apparition, 4.1

a good and virtuous nature may recoil in an imperial charge

malcolm, 4.2

the Thane of Fife, had a wife - where is she now? what, will these hands ne’er be clean?

LM, 5.1

out, out, brief candle, life’s but a walking shadow, a poor player that struts and frets his hour upon the tage, and then is heard no more. it is a tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury signifying nothing

M, 5.5

despair thy charm, and let the angel whom thou still hast served tell thee, Macduff was from his mother’s womb untimely ripped

Macduff, 5.7

yet i will try the last. before my body i throw my warlike shield: lay on Macduff, and damned be him that first cries ‘Hold, enough!’

M, 5.7

look, how our partner’s rapt

banquo, 1.3, power

all hail M, thou shalt be king hereafter!

third witch, 1.3, power

thou shalt get kings, though thou be none. so all hail, M and Banquo!

third witch, 1.3, power

if good, why do i yield to the suggestion whose horrid image doth unfix my hair and make my seated heart konck at my ribs against the use of nature? present fears are less than horrible imaginings. my thought, whose murder yet is but fantastical, shakes so my single state of man that function is smothered in surmise and nothing is but what is not

M, 1.3, power

my plenteous joys, wanton in fulness, seek to hide themselves in drops of sorrow. - sons, kinsmen, thanes, and you whose places are nearest, know we wil establish our estate upon our eldest, Malcolm, whom we name hereafter the Prince of Cumberland; which honour must not unaccompanied invest him only, but signs of nobleness, like stars, shall shie on all deservers. - from hence to Inverness and bind us further to you

Duncan, 1.4, power

all hail, M! hail to thee, Thane of Glamis!

all hail, M! hail to thee, Thane of Cawdor!

all hail, M, that shalt be king hereafter!

all three witches (one, then two, then three), 1.3, power

my noble partner you greet with present grace and great prediction of noble having and of royal hope, that he seems rapt withal. to me you speak not. if you can look into the seeds of time, and say which grain will grow and which will not, speak, then, to me, who neither beg nor fear your favors nor your hate

banquo, 1.3, ambition

the Prince of Cumberland! that is a step on which i must fall down, or else o’erleap, for in my way it lies. stars, hide your fires; let not light see my black and deep desires. the eye wink in the hand; yet let that be which the eye fears, when it is done, to see

M, 1.4, ambition

thou wouldst be great, art not without ambition, but without the illness should attend it

LM, 1.5

i’ll drain him dry as hay. sleep shall neither night nor day hang upon his penthouse lid. he shall live a man forbid. weary sev’nnights, nine times nine, shall he dwindle, peak and pine. though his bark cannot be lot, yet it shall be tempest-tossed.

first witch, 1.3, supernatural, gender

when shall we meet again in thunder, lightning, or in rain?

when the hurly-burly’s done, when the battle’s lost and won

first witch, then second witch, 1.1

you should be women, and yet your beards forbid me to interpret that you are so

banquo, 1.3, gender

what bloody man is that? he can report, as seemeth by his plight, of the revolt the newest state

duncan, 1.2, violence

like valor’s minion carved out his passage till he faced the slave; which ne’er shook hands, nore bade farewell to him, till he unseamed him from the nave to th’ chops, and fixed his head upon our battlements

captain, 1.2, violence

come what come may. time and the hour runs through the roughest day

M, 1.3, time

thy letters have transported me beyond this ignorant present, and i feel now the future in the instant

LM, 1.6, time

say to the king the knowledge of the broil, as thou didst leave it

doubtful it stood, as two spent swimmers that do cling together and choke their art

malcom, then captain, 1.2, violence