Passages from The Tempest

Some dreams are worth crying over when they end.

Be not afeard; the isle is full of noises,Sounds and sweet airs, that give delight and hurt not.Sometimes a thousand twangling instrumentsWill hum about mine ears, and sometime voicesThat, if I then had waked after long sleep,Will make me sleep again: and then, in dreaming,The clouds methought would open and show richesReady to drop upon me, that, when I waked,I cried to dream again.

The thought that arrives when a good evening ends.

Our revels now are ended. These our actors,As I foretold you, were all spirits andAre melted into air, into thin air:And, like the baseless fabric of this vision,The cloud-capp’d towers, the gorgeous palaces,The solemn temples, the great globe itself,Yea, all which it inherit, shall dissolveAnd, like this insubstantial pageant faded,Leave not a rack behind. We are such stuffAs dreams are made on, and our little lifeIs rounded with a sleep.

He remembers kindness and theft in the same breath.

I must eat my dinner.This island’s mine, by Sycorax my mother,Which thou takest from me. When thou camest first,Thou strokedst me and madest much of me, wouldst give meWater with berries in’t, and teach me howTo name the bigger light, and how the less,That burn by day and night: and then I loved theeAnd show’d thee all the qualities o’ the isle,The fresh springs, brine-pits, barren place and fertile:Cursed be I that did so! All the charmsOf Sycorax, toads, beetles, bats, light on you!

What would you give up to stop being feared?

Set roaring war: to the dread rattling thunderHave I given fire and rifted Jove’s stout oakWith his own bolt; the strong-based promontoryHave I made shake and by the spurs pluck’d upThe pine and cedar: graves at my commandHave waked their sleepers, oped, and let ’em forthBy my so potent art. But this rough magicI here abjure, and, when I have requiredSome heavenly music, which even now I do,To work mine end upon their senses thatThis airy charm is for, I’ll break my staff,Bury it certain fathoms in the earth,And deeper than did ever plummet soundI’ll drown my book. Solemn music.

What it costs to feel a shipwreck you were never in.

If by your art, my dearest father, you havePut the wild waters in this roar, allay them.The sky, it seems, would pour down stinking pitch,But that the sea, mounting to the welkin’s cheek,Dashes the fire out. O, I have sufferedWith those that I saw suffer: a brave vessel,Who had, no doubt, some noble creature in her,Dash’d all to pieces. O, the cry did knockAgainst my very heart. Poor souls, they perish’d.Had I been any god of power, I wouldHave sunk the sea within the earth or ereIt should the good ship so have swallow’d andThe fraughting souls within her.

Terror, described by the spirit who arranged it.

Not a soulBut felt a fever of the mad and play’dSome tricks of desperation. All but marinersPlunged in the foaming brine and quit the vessel,Then all afire with me: the king’s son, Ferdinand,With hair up-staring—then like reeds, not hair—Was the first man that leap’d; cried, “Hell is emptyAnd all the devils are here.”

What it sounds like to ask for exactly what you want.

At mine unworthiness that dare not offerWhat I desire to give, and much less takeWhat I shall die to want. But this is trifling;And all the more it seeks to hide itself,The bigger bulk it shows. Hence, bashful cunning!And prompt me, plain and holy innocence!I am your wife, if you will marry me;If not, I’ll die your maid: to be your fellowYou may deny me; but I’ll be your servant,Whether you will or no.

Being small, being free, and having nowhere in particular to be.

Where the bee sucks, there suck I:In a cowslip’s bell I lie;There I couch when owls do cry.On the bat’s back I do flyAfter summer merrily.Merrily, merrily shall I live nowUnder the blossom that hangs on the bough.

Shipwrecked, storm overhead, and his mind has moved on to lunch.

Here’s neither bush nor shrub, to bear off any weather at all, and another storm brewing; I hear it sing i’ the wind: yond same black cloud, yond huge one, looks like a foul bombard that would shed his liquor. If it should thunder as it did before, I know not where to hide my head: yond same cloud cannot choose but fall by pailfuls. What have we here? a man or a fish? dead or alive? A fish: he smells like a fish; a very ancient and fish-like smell; a kind of not of the newest Poor-John. A strange fish!