Cowards die many times before their deaths;The valiant never taste of death but once.
William Shakespeare · Julius Caesar
Courage & motivation
“Cowards die many times before their deaths;”
- Author
- William Shakespeare
- Work
- Julius Caesar
- Found in
- The Complete Works of William Shakespeare
- Year
- 1623
- Chapter / part
- Act II, Scene 2
- Length
- 15 words
- Source
- Project Gutenberg eBook #100
Public domain. This passage is in the public domain. William Shakespeare died in 1616, more than 70 years ago, and the work was first published in 1623. You can copy, print, read aloud or sell it without asking permission; a credit is kind but not required. The text is copied word for word from the Project Gutenberg edition linked here.
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We few, we happy few, we band of brothers.For he today that sheds his blood with meShall be my brother; be he ne’er so vile,This day shall gentle his condition;And gentlemen in England now abedShall think themselves accurs’d they were not here,And hold their manhoods cheap whiles any speaksThat fought with us upon Saint Crispin’s day.
Some are born great, some achieve greatness, and some have greatness thrust upon ’em.
OUT of the night that covers me,Black as the Pit from pole to pole,I thank whatever gods may beFor my unconquerable soul.In the fell clutch of circumstanceI have not winced nor cried aloud.Under the bludgeonings of chanceMy head is bloody, but unbowed.Beyond this place of wrath and tearsLooms but the Horror of the shade,And yet the menace of the yearsFinds, and shall find, me unafraid.It matters not how strait the gate,How charged with punishments the scroll,I am the master of my fate:I am the captain of my soul.
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,If all men count with you, but none too much;If you can fill the unforgiving minuteWith sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it,And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
Tho’ much is taken, much abides; and tho’We are not now that strength which in old daysMoved earth and heaven; that which we are, we are;One equal temper of heroic hearts,Made weak by time and fate, but strong in willTo strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
Alfred, Lord TennysonThe Early Poems of Alfred Lord Tennyson, 1842 · Ulysses
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