“I take the world to be but as a stage,
Where net-maskt men do play their personage.”
Dialogue between Heraclitus and Democritus. Compare: "All the world ’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players", William Shakespeare, As You Like It, Act ii. Scene 7.
Bartlett's Familiar Quotations, 10th ed. (1919)
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Guillaume de Salluste Du Bartas48
French writer 1544–1590Related quotes
“The world's a stage on which all parts are played.”
Thomas Middleton (1580–1627) English playwright and poet
A Game of Chess (1624), Act v. Sc. 1. Compare: "All the world ’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players", Shakespeare, As You Like It, Act ii. Sc. 7.; "The world ’s a theatre, the earth a stage, Which God and Nature do with actors fill", Thomas Heywood, Apology for Actors (1612).
“I'm the empty stage where various actors act out various plays.”
Fernando Pessoa book The Book of Disquiet
Source: The Book of Disquiet
Guillaume de Salluste Du Bartas (1544–1590) French writer
First Week, First Day. Compare: "All the world ’s a stage, And all the men and women merely players", William Shakespeare, As You Like It, Act ii. Scene 7.
La Semaine; ou, Création du monde (1578)
Sam Keen (1931) author, professor, and philosopher
Source: The Passionate Life (1983), pp. 135-136
“If all the world is a stage, where is the audience sitting?”
George Carlin (1937–2008) American stand-up comedian
Dogen (1200–1253) Japanese Zen buddhist teacher
As translated in The Zen Poetry of Dōgen : Verses from the Mountain of Eternal Peace (1997) by Steven Heine, p. 61