Careful Words

desperate (n.)

desperate (adj.)

Diseases desperate grown

By desperate appliance are relieved,

Or not at all.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Hamlet. Act iv. Sc. 3.

  For a desperate disease a desperate cure.

Michael De Montaigne (1533-1592): Book ii. Chap. iii. The Custom of the Isle of Cea.

Diseases desperate grown

By desperate appliance are relieved,

Or not at all.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Hamlet. Act iv. Sc. 3.

Beware of desperate steps! The darkest day,

Live till to-morrow, will have pass'd away.

William Cowper (1731-1800): The Needless Alarm. Moral.