'T is a little thing

To give a cup of water; yet its draught

Of cool refreshment, drained by fevered lips,

May give a shock of pleasure to the frame

More exquisite than when nectarean juice

Renews the life of joy in happiest hours.

Thomas Noon Talfourd (1795-1854): Ion. Act i. Sc. 2.

Weave the warp, and weave the woof,

The winding-sheet of Edward's race.

Give ample room and verge enough

The characters of hell to trace.

Thomas Gray (1716-1771): The Bard. II. 1, Line 1.

Beware

Of entrance to a quarrel; but being in,

Bear 't that the opposed may beware of thee.

Give every man thy ear, but few thy voice;

Take each man's censure, but reserve thy judgment.

Costly thy habit as thy purse can buy,

But not express'd in fancy; rich, not gaudy;

For the apparel oft proclaims the man.

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

An old man, broken with the storms of state,

Is come to lay his weary bones among ye:

Give him a little earth for charity!

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): King Henry VIII. Act iv. Sc. 2.

By flatterers besieg'd,

And so obliging that he ne'er oblig'd;

Like Cato, give his little senate laws,

And sit attentive to his own applause.

Alexander Pope (1688-1744): Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot. Prologue to the Satires. Line 207.

A brave man struggling in the storms of fate,

And greatly falling with a falling state.

While Cato gives his little senate laws,

What bosom beats not in his country's cause?

Alexander Pope (1688-1744): Prologue to Mr. Addison's Cato.

Give thy thoughts no tongue.

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

Divine in hookas, glorious in a pipe

When tipp'd with amber, mellow, rich, and ripe;

Like other charmers, wooing the caress

More dazzlingly when daring in full dress;

Yet thy true lovers more admire by far

Thy naked beauties—give me a cigar!

Lord Byron 1788-1824: The Island. Canto ii. Stanza 19.

Give me a look, give me a face,

That makes simplicity a grace;

Robes loosely flowing, hair as free,—

Such sweet neglect more taketh me

Than all the adulteries of art:

They strike mine eyes, but not my heart.

Ben Jonson (1573-1637): Epicoene; Or, the Silent Woman. Act i. Sc. 1.

Give me again my hollow tree,

A crust of bread, and liberty.

Alexander Pope (1688-1744): Satires, Epistles, and Odes of Horace. Satire vi. Book ii. Line 220.

Give me another horse: bind up my wounds.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): King Richard III. Act v. Sc. 3.

Maid of Athens, ere we part,

Give, oh give me back my heart!

Lord Byron 1788-1824: Maid of Athens.

Backward, flow backward, O tide of the years!

I am so weary of toil and of tears,—

Toil without recompense, tears all in vain!

Take them, and give me my childhood again!

Elizabeth Akers Allen (1832-1911): Rock me to sleep.

Be sure of it; give me the ocular proof.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Othello. Act iii. Sc. 3.

They are not a pipe for fortune's finger

To sound what stop she please. Give me that man

That is not passion's slave, and I will wear him

In my heart's core, ay, in my heart of heart,

As I do thee.—Something too much of this.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Hamlet. Act iii. Sc. 2.

A narrow compass! and yet there

Dwelt all that's good, and all that's fair;

Give me but what this riband bound,

Take all the rest the sun goes round.

Edmund Waller (1605-1687): On a Girdle.

Give sorrow words: the grief that does not speak

Whispers the o'er-fraught heart and bids it break.

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

He will give the devil his due.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): King Henry IV. Part I. Act i. Sc. 2.

Go, Soul, the body's guest,

Upon a thankless arrant:

Fear not to touch the best,

The truth shall be thy warrant:

Go, since I needs must die,

And give the world the lie.

Sir Walter Raleigh (1552-1618): The Lie.

I give thee all,—I can no more,

Though poor the off'ring be;

My heart and lute are all the store

That I can bring to thee.

Thomas Moore (1779-1852): My Heart and Lute.

I give thee sixpence! I will see thee damned first.

George Canning (1770-1827): The Friend of Humanity and the Knife-Grinder.

Give thy thoughts no tongue.

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

They please, are pleas'd; they give to get esteem,

Till seeming blest, they grow to what they seem.

Oliver Goldsmith (1728-1774): The Traveller. Line 266.

Give what thou canst, without Thee we are poor;

And with Thee rich, take what Thou wilt away.

William Cowper (1731-1800): The Task. Book v. The Winter Morning Walk. Line 905.