PRISONERS.

It is not for prisoners to be too silent in their words.

PRODIGALITY.

What will this come to?

He commands us to provide, and give great gifts,
And all out of an empty coffer;

Nor will he know his purse; or yield me this,
To show him what a beggar his heart is,
Being of no power to make his wishes good;
His promises fly so beyond his state,
That what he speaks is all in debt, he owes
For every word; he is so kind, that he now
Pays interest for it.

PRODIGIES (See also PORTENTS.)

In the most high and palmy state of Rome,
A little ere the mightiest Julius fell,

The graves stood tenantless, and the sheeted dead
Did squeak and gibber in the Roman streets.

Stars with trains of fire, and dews of blood,
Disasters in the sun; and the moist star,
Upon whose influence Neptune's empire stands,
Was sick almost to doomsday, with eclipse.
No natural exhalation in the sky,
No scape of nature, no distemper'd day,
No common wind, no customed event,
But they will pluck away his natural cause,
And call them meteors, prodigies, and signs,
Abortives, presages, and tongues of heaven,
Plainly denouncing vengeance upon John.

Fierce fiery warriors fight upon the clouds,
In ranks, and squadrons, and right form of war,

Which drizzled blood upon the capitol:

The noise of battle hurtled in the air,

Horses did neigh, and dying men did groan.

J. C. ii. 2.

When beggars die, there are no comets seen;

The heavens themselves blaze forth the death of princes.

PROFLIGACY.

His rash fierce blaze of riot cannot last;

For violent fires soon burn out themselves :

J. C. ii. 2.

Small showers last long, but sudden storms are short;
He tires betimes, that spurs too fast betimes;
With eager feeding food doth choke the feeder:
Light vanity, insatiate cormorant,
Consuming means, soon preys upon itself.

PROGNOSTICS.

Against ill chances men are ever merry,
But heaviness fore-runs the good event.

R. II. ii. 1.

H. IV. PT. 11. iv. 2.

PROLIXITY.

The date is out of such prolixity.

PROMISES.

R. J. i. 4.

Promising is the very air o' the time it opens the eyes of
expectation performance is ever the duller for his act and, but
in the plainer and simpler kind of people, the deed is quite out of
use. To promise, is most courtly and fashionable; performance is
a kind of will and testament, which argues a great sickness in his
judgment that makes it.
T. A. v. 1.

His promises were, as he then was, mighty;
But his performance, as he now is, nothing.
I see, Sir, you are liberal in offers:

You taught me first to beg; and now, methinks,
You teach me how a beggar should be answer'd.
Thy promises are like Adonis' gardens,
That one day bloom'd, and fruitful were the next.

The king is kind; and, well we know, the king
Knows at what time to promise, when to pay.

PROMOTION.

H. VIII. iv. 2.

M. V. iv. 1.

H. VI. PT. 1. i. 6.

H. IV. PT. I. iv. 3.

Many so arrive at second masters, upon their first lord's neck.

PROMPTITUDE.

Anticipating time with starting courage.

For at hand,

Not trusting to this halting legate here,

Whom he hath us'd rather for sport than need,
Is warlike John.

PROOF.

Let the end try the man.

Let proof speak.

PROPERTY.

T. A. iv. 3.

T. C. iv. 5.

K. J. v. 2.

H、 IV. PT. 11. ii. 2.

Cym. iii. 1.

What judgment shall I dread, doing no wrong?
You have among you many a purchas'd slave;
Which, like your asses, and your dogs, and mules,
You use in abject and in slavish parts,
Because you bought them: shall I say to you,
Let them be free, marry them to your heirs?
Why sweat they under burdens ? let their beds
Be made as soft as yours, and let their palates
Be season'd with such viands. You will answer,
The slaves are ours :-so do I answer you.
PROPELLING.

As doth a sail, fill'd with a fretting gust,
Command an argosy to stem the waves.

M. V. iv. 1.

H. VI. PT. III. ii. 6.

Come hither, Fabian; we'll whisper o'er a couplet or two of

most sage saws.

PROVIDENCE (See also OMNipotence).

Our indiscretion sometimes serves us well,

T. N. iii. 4.

When our deep plots do pall: and that should teach us,
There's a divinity that shapes our ends,
Rough-hew them how we will.

PROVOCATION.

H. v. 2.

Have you not set mine honour at the stake,

And baited it with all the unmuzzled thoughts
That tyrannous heart can think?

T. N. iii. 1.

PRUDENCE.

Take up this mangled matter at the best:
Men do their broken weapons rather use
Than their bare hands.

When we mean to build,
We first survey the plot, then draw the model;
And when we see the figure of the house,
Then must we rate the cost of the erection :
Which if we find outweighs ability,

What do we then but draw anew the model

In fewer offices; or, at least, desist

To build at all? Much more, in this great work,
(Which is almost to pluck a kingdom down,
And set another up) should we survey

The plot of situation, and the model;
Consent upon a sure foundation;
Question surveyors, know our own estate,
How able such a work to undergo,
To weigh against his opposite; or else,

We fortify in paper, and in figures,

Using the names of men, instead of men:
Like one, that draws the model of a house

Beyond his power to build it; who, half through,
Gives o'er, and leaves his part-created cost

O. i. 3.

PRUDENCE,-continued.

A naked subject to the weeping clouds,
And waste for churlish winter's tyranny.

PRUDERY.

H. IV. PT. II. i. 3.

Dost thou think, because thou art virtuous, there shall be no more cakes and ale ?

PRUNING.

All superfluous branches

We lop away, that bearing boughs may live.

PURGATORY.

Doom'd for a certain time to walk the night,
And, for the day, confin'd to fast in fires,

Till the foul crimes, done in my days of nature,
Are burnt and purg'd away.

PURITY.

The very ice of chastity is in them.

T. N. ii. 3.

R. II. iii. 4.

H. i. 5.

A. Y. iii. 4.

In every thing, the purpose must weigh with the folly.

PURSUIT.

Let us score their backs,

And snatch 'em up, as we take hares, behind;
'Tis sport to maul a runner.

H. IV. PT. II. ii. 2.

Mount you, my lord, tow'rd Berwick post amain;
Edward and Richard, like a brace of greyhounds,
Having the fearful flying hare in sight,
With fiery eyes, sparkling for very wrath,
And bloody steel, grasp'd in their ireful hands,
Are at our backs; and therefore hence amain.

AND POSSESSION.

All things that are,

Are with more spirit chased than enjoy'd.

A. C. iv. 7.

H. VI. PT. II. ii. 5.

How like a younker, or a prodigal,
The scarfed bark puts from her native bay,
Hugg'd and embraced by the strumpet wind!
How like the prodigal doth she return,
With over-weather'd ribs, and ragged sails,
Lean, rent, and beggar'd by the strumpet wind!

Women are angels, wooing:

Things won are done, joy's soul lies in the doing:
That she belov'd knows nought, that knows not this,-
Men prize the thing ungain'd more than it is.

Q.

QUALITY.

The rich stream of lords and ladies.

H. VIII. iv. 1.

She sweeps it through the court with troops of ladies.

What a sweep of vanity comes this way!

QUARREL.

H. VI. PT. II. i. 3.

Good lord! what madness rules in brain-sick men ;
When, for so slight and frivolous a cause,

Such factious emulations shall arise !

T. A. i. 2.

I remember a mass of things, but nothing distinctly; a quarrel, but nothing wherefore.

I heard the clink and fall of swords,

And Cassio high in oath.

H. VI. PT. 1. iv. 1.

O. ii. 3.

O. ii. 3.

Thou! why thou wilt quarrel with a man that hath a hair more, or a hair less, in his beard than thou hast. Thou wilt quarrel with a man for cracking nuts, having no other reason but because thou hast hazel eyes.

He'll be as full of quarrel and offence
As my young mistress' dog.

She had all the royal makings of a queen;

As holy oil, Edward Confessor's crown,

R. J. iii. 1.

0. ii. 3.

K. L. iii. 1.

H. VI. PT. I. ii. 4.

The rod, and bird of peace, and all such emblems,
Laid nobly on her.

A queen in jest, only to fill the scene.

MAB.

O, then, I see, queen Mab hath been with you.
She is the fairies' midwife; and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate-stone,
On the fore-finger of an alderman,
Drawn with a team of little atomies
Athwart men's noses as they lie asleep :

Her waggon-spokes made of long spinners' legs;
The cover, of the wings of grasshoppers;
The traces, of the smallest spider's web;
The collars, of the moonshine's watery beams :
Her whip, of crickets' bone; the lash, of film :
Her waggoner, a small gray-coated gnat,

H. VIII. iv. 1.

R. III. iv. 4.