Date: 1594

"I am Revenge, sent from th' infernal kingdom / To ease the gnawing vulture of thy mind."

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: 1597

"That our swift-wingèd souls may catch the King's, / Or like obedient subjects follow him / To his new kingdom of ne'er-changing night."

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: 1597

"O serpent heart hid with a flow'ring face! / Did ever dragon keep so fair a cave?"

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: 1597

"Thy head is as full of quarrels as an egg is full of meat, and yet thy head hath been beaten as addle as an egg for quarrelling."

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: 1597

"And for we think the eagle-wingèd pride / Of sky-aspiring and ambitious thoughts."

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: 1603

"There's something in his soul / O'er which his melancholy sits on brood, / And I do doubt the hatch and the disclose / Will be some danger."

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: 1603

"O wretched state, O bosom black as death, / O limèd soul that, struggling to be free, / Art more engaged!"

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: 1603

"Haste, haste me to know it, that with wings as swift / As meditation or the thoughts of love / May sweep to my revenge."

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: 1603

"Cudgel thy brains no more about it, for your / dull ass will not mend his pace with beating."

— Shakespeare, William (1564-1616)

Date: 1700, 1702

"Thought is Damnation, 'tis the Plague of Devils. / To think on what they are! and see this Weapon / Shall shield me from it, plunge me in forgetfulness. / Er'e the dire Scorpion Thought can rouse to sting me."

— Rowe, Nicholas (1674-1718)