Careful Words

hear (n.)

hear (v.)

I hear a voice you cannot hear,

Which says I must not stay;

I see a hand you cannot see,

Which beckons me away.

Thomas Tickell (1686-1740): Colin and Lucy.

  Romans, countrymen, and lovers! hear me for my cause, and be silent that you may hear.

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

Be swift to hear, slow to speak, slow to wrath.

New Testament: James i. 19.

For aught that I could ever read,

Could ever hear by tale or history,

The course of true love never did run smooth.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): A Midsummer Night's Dream. Act i. Sc. 1.

  He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.

New Testament: Mark iv. 9.

The bell invites me.

Hear it not, Duncan; for it is a knell

That summons thee to heaven or to hell.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Macbeth. Act ii. Sc. 1.

He ceas'd; but left so pleasing on their ear

His voice, that list'ning still they seem'd to hear.

Alexander Pope (1688-1744): The Odyssey of Homer. Book xiii. Line 1.

  Romans, countrymen, and lovers! hear me for my cause, and be silent that you may hear.

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

Who is so deafe or so blinde as is hee

That wilfully will neither heare nor see?

John Heywood (Circa 1565): Proverbes. Part ii. Chap. ix.

  None so deaf as those that will not hear.

Mathew Henry (1662-1714): Commentaries. Psalm lviii.

Let not the heavens hear these tell-tale women

Rail on the Lord's anointed.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): King Richard III. Act iv. Sc. 4.

But 'midst the crowd, the hum, the shock of men,

To hear, to see, to feel, and to possess,

And roam along, the world's tired denizen,

With none who bless us, none whom we can bless.

Lord Byron 1788-1824: Childe Harold's Pilgrimage. Canto ii. Stanza 26.