“If to do were as easy as to know what were good to do, chapels had been churches, and poor men’s cottages princes’ palaces.”

—  William Shakespeare , The Merchant of Venice

Portia, Act I, scene ii.
The Merchant of Venice (1596–7)

Adopted from Wikiquote. Last update Sept. 28, 2023. History

Help us to complete the source, original and additional information

Do you have more details about the quote "If to do were as easy as to know what were good to do, chapels had been churches, and poor men’s cottages princes’ pala…" by William Shakespeare?
William Shakespeare photo
William Shakespeare 699
English playwright and poet 1564–1616

Related quotes

Stanisław Leszczyński photo

“Can princes born in palaces be sensible of the misery of those who dwell in cottages?”

Stanisław Leszczyński (1677–1766) king of Poland

No. 56.
Maxims and Moral Sentences

“Men who did not know that they were slaves do not know that they have been freed.”

Milton Mayer (1908–1986) American journalist

Source: They Thought They Were Free: The Germans, 1933-35 (1955), p. 62; cited in: Quotable Quotes: They Thought They Were Free http://econengineer.wordpress.com/2012/07/01/quotable-quotes-they-thought-they-were-free/ by John@EconEngineer in: The Economical Engineer (1 July 2012)

Benjamin Disraeli photo

“The palace is not safe, when the cottage is not happy.”

Benjamin Disraeli (1804–1881) British Conservative politician, writer, aristocrat and Prime Minister

Speech to Wynyard Horticultural Show (1848), quoted in William Flavelle Monypenny and George Earle Buckle, The Life of Benjamin Disraeli, Earl of Beaconsfield. Volume II. 1860–1881 (London: John Murray, 1929), p. 709.
1840s

Marilynne Robinson photo

“It is a good thing to know what it is to be poor, and a better thing if you can do it in company.”

Marilynne Robinson Gilead

Source: Gilead

Bruce Springsteen photo

“The wise men were all fools, what to do?”

Bruce Springsteen (1949) American singer and songwriter

"Last to Die"
Song lyrics, Magic (2007)

Theodore Roosevelt photo

“To sit home, read one's favorite paper, and scoff at the misdeeds of the men who do things is easy, but it is markedly ineffective. It is what evil men count upon the good men's doing.”

Theodore Roosevelt (1858–1919) American politician, 26th president of the United States

" The Higher Life of American Cities http://www.theodore-roosevelt.com/images/research/treditorials/o151.pdf", in The Outlook (21 December 1895), p. 1083-1085
1890s

Roger Ebert photo

“I do not often attribute motives to audience members, nor do I try to read their minds, but the people who were sitting around me on Monday morning made it easy for me to know what they were thinking. They talked out loud. And if they seriously believed the things they were saying, they were vicarious sex criminals.”

Roger Ebert (1942–2013) American film critic, author, journalist, and TV presenter

Review http://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/i-spit-on-your-grave-1980 of I Spit on Your Grave (16 July 1980)
Reviews, Zero star reviews

George MacDonald photo

“You thought you were going to be made into a decent little cottage: but He is building a palace. He intends to come and live in it himself. (Quoted by C. S. Lewis in Mere Christianity)”

George MacDonald (1824–1905) Scottish journalist, novelist
Jerome K. Jerome photo

“It is easy enough to say that poverty is no crime. No; if it were men wouldn't be ashamed of it. It is a blunder, though, and is punished as such. A poor man is despised the whole world over.”

Jerome K. Jerome book Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow

"On Being Hard Up".
Idle Thoughts of an Idle Fellow (1886)

“My parents, uncles, aunts, they always talked about what they were doing, where they were working, what happened that day. Sooner or later, they’d be telling a story from the old days, he recalls. We were very poor, but proud of the hard work that provided what we had.”

Rudolfo Anaya (1937) Novelist, poet

On his family in “THE GODFATHER” https://www.newmexico.org/nmmagazine/articles/post/the-godfather/ in New Mexico Magazine (2017)

Related topics