Careful Words

nothing (n.)

nothing (adv.)

nothing (adj.)

  Nothing can come out of nothing, any more than a thing can go back to nothing.

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121-180 a d): Meditations. iv. 4.

A man of sovereign parts he is esteem'd;

Well fitted in arts, glorious in arms:

Nothing becomes him ill that he would well.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Love's Labour's Lost. Act ii. Sc. 1.

Strongly it bears us along in swelling and limitless billows;

Nothing before and nothing behind but the sky and the ocean.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772-1834): The Homeric Hexameter. (Translated from Schiller.)

  Blessed is he who expects nothing, for he shall never be disappointed.

Alexander Pope (1688-1744): Letter to Gay, Oct. 6, 1727.

When you do dance, I wish you

A wave o' the sea, that you might ever do

Nothing but that.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): The Winter's Tale. Act iv. Sc. 4.

True, I talk of dreams,

Which are the children of an idle brain,

Begot of nothing but vain fantasy.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Romeo and Juliet. Act i. Sc. 4.

Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail

Or knock the breast, no weakness, no contempt,

Dispraise, or blame,—nothing but well and fair,

And what may quiet us in a death so noble.

John Milton (1608-1674): Samson Agonistes. Line 1721.

  We can say nothing but what hath been said. Our poets steal from Homer. . . . Our story-dressers do as much; he that comes last is commonly best.

Robert Burton (1576-1640): Anatomy of Melancholy. Democritus to the Reader.

  In fine, nothing is said now that has not been said before.

Terence (185-159 b c): Eunuchus. The Prologue. 41.

  Nothing can be done at once hastily and prudently.

Publius Syrus (42 b c): Maxim 557.

Though nothing can bring back the hour

Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower.

William Wordsworth (1770-1850): Ode. Intimations of Immortality. Stanza 10.

  Nothing can come out of nothing, any more than a thing can go back to nothing.

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121-180 a d): Meditations. iv. 4.

Nothing can cover his high fame but heaven;

No pyramids set off his memories,

But the eternal substance of his greatness,—

To which I leave him.

Beaumont And Fletcher: The False One. Act ii. Sc. 1.

Dare to be true: nothing can need a lie;

A fault which needs it most, grows two thereby.

George Herbert (1593-1632): The Church Porch.

Better be with the dead,

Whom we, to gain our peace, have sent to peace,

Than on the torture of the mind to lie

In restless ecstasy. Duncan is in his grave;

After life's fitful fever he sleeps well:

Treason has done his worst; nor steel, nor poison,

Malice domestic, foreign levy, nothing,

Can touch him further.

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

And nothing can we call our own but death

And that small model of the barren earth

Which serves as paste and cover to our bones.

For God's sake, let us sit upon the ground

And tell sad stories of the death of kings.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): King Richard II. Act iii. Sc. 2.

Nothing comes amiss; so money comes withal.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): The Taming of the Shrew. Act i. Sc. 2.

Sleep till the end, true soul and sweet!

Nothing comes to thee new or strange.

Sleep full of rest from head to feet;

Lie still, dry dust, secure of change.

Alfred Tennyson (1809-1892): To J. S.

He nothing common did, or mean,

Upon that memorable scene.

Andrew Marvell (1620-1678): Upon Cromwell's return from Ireland.

  That indolent but agreeable condition of doing nothing.

Pliny The Younger (61-105 a d): Letters. Book viii. Letter ix. 3.

  Fame sometimes hath created something of nothing.

Thomas Fuller (1608-1661): Holy and Profane State. Fame.

Death in itself is nothing; but we fear

To be we know not what, we know not where.

John Dryden (1631-1701): Aurengzebe. Act iv. Sc. 1.

Ah, surely nothing dies but something mourns.

Lord Byron 1788-1824: Don Juan. Canto iii. Stanza 108.

In virtues nothing earthly could surpass her,

Save thine "incomparable oil," Macassar!

Lord Byron 1788-1824: Don Juan. Canto i. Stanza 17.

  There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so.

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

As if religion was intended

For nothing else but to be mended.

Samuel Butler (1600-1680): Hudibras. Part i. Canto i. Line 205.

Nothing emboldens sin so much as mercy.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Timon of Athens. Act iii. Sc. 5.

  Nothing except a battle lost can be half so melancholy as a battle won.

Duke Of Wellington (1769-1852): Despatch, 1815.

I have done the state some service, and they know 't.

No more of that. I pray you, in your letters,

When you shall these unlucky deeds relate,

Speak of me as I am; nothing extenuate,

Nor set down aught in malice. Then, must you speak

Of one that loved not wisely but too well;

Of one not easily jealous, but being wrought

Perplex'd in the extreme; of one whose hand,

Like the base Indian, threw a pearl away

Richer than all his tribe; of one whose subdued eyes,

Albeit unused to the melting mood,

Drop tears as fast as the Arabian trees

Their medicinal gum.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Othello. Act v. Sc. 2.

  All that is harmony for thee, O Universe, is in harmony with me as well. Nothing that comes at the right time for thee is too early or too late for me. Everything is fruit to me that thy seasons bring, O Nature. All things come of thee, have their being in thee, and return to thee.

Marcus Aurelius Antoninus (121-180 a d): Meditations. iv. 23.

To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,

Creeps in this petty pace from day to day

To the last syllable of recorded time,

And all our yesterdays have lighted fools

The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!

Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player

That struts and frets his hour upon the stage

And then is heard no more: it is a tale

Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,

Signifying nothing.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Macbeth. Act v. Sc. 5.

The lunatic, the lover, and the poet

Are of imagination all compact:

One sees more devils than vast hell can hold,

That is, the madman: the lover, all as frantic,

Sees Helen's beauty in a brow of Egypt:

The poet's eye, in a fine frenzy rolling,

Doth glance from heaven to earth, from earth to heaven;

And as imagination bodies forth

The forms of things unknown, the poet's pen

Turns them to shapes, and gives to airy nothing

A local habitation and a name.

Such tricks hath strong imagination,

That if it would but apprehend some joy,

It comprehends some bringer of that joy;

Or in the night, imagining some fear,

How easy is a bush supposed a bear!

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

But there's nothing half so sweet in life

As love's young dream.

Thomas Moore (1779-1852): Love's Young Dream.

Lord of himself, though not of lands;

And having nothing, yet hath all.

Sir Henry Wotton (1568-1639): The Character of a Happy Life.

  And there is nothing hid from the heat thereof.

Old Testament: Psalm xix. 6.

  I have everything, yet have nothing; and although I possess nothing, still of nothing am I in want.

Terence (185-159 b c): Eunuchus. Act ii. Sc. 2, 12. (243.)

  He left a paper sealed up, wherein were found three articles as his last will: "I owe much; I have nothing; I give the rest to the poor."

Martin Luther (1483-1546): Motteux's Life.

  I have everything, yet have nothing; and although I possess nothing, still of nothing am I in want.

Terence (185-159 b c): Eunuchus. Act ii. Sc. 2, 12. (243.)

For I am nothing, if not critical.

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

There's nothing ill can dwell in such a temple:

If the ill spirit have so fair a house,

Good things will strive to dwell with 't.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): The Tempest. Act i. Sc. 2.

  As some say, Solon was the author of the apophthegm, "Nothing in excess."

Diogenes Laertius (Circa 200 a d): Solon. xvi.

Nothing in his life

Became him like the leaving it; he died

As one that had been studied in his death

To throw away the dearest thing he owed,

As 't were a careless trifle.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Macbeth. Act i. Sc. 4.

  Gratiano speaks an infinite deal of nothing, more than any man in all Venice. His reasons are as two grains of wheat hid in two bushels of chaff: you shall seek all day ere you find them, and when you have them, they are not worth the search.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): The Merchant of Venice. Act i. Sc. 1.

Nothing is

But what is not.

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

  Nothing is changed in France; there is only one Frenchman more.

Nor knowest thou what argument

Thy life to thy neighbor's creed has lent.

All are needed by each one;

Nothing is fair or good alone.

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882): Each and All.

Nothing is impossible to a willing hart.

John Heywood (Circa 1565): Proverbes. Part i. Chap. iv.

Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail

Or knock the breast, no weakness, no contempt,

Dispraise, or blame,—nothing but well and fair,

And what may quiet us in a death so noble.

John Milton (1608-1674): Samson Agonistes. Line 1721.

  Let us consider the reason of the case. For nothing is law that is not reason.

Sir John Powell (1633-1696): Coggs vs. Bernard, 2 Lord Raymond, 911.

Attempt the end, and never stand to doubt;

Nothing's so hard but search will find it out.

Robert Herrick (1591-1674): Seek and Find.

Nothing is there to come, and nothing past,

But an eternal now does always last.

Abraham Cowley (1618-1667): Davideis. Book i. Line 25.

  Certainly nothing is unnatural that is not physically impossible.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751-1816): The Critic. Act ii. Sc. 1.

  They have learned nothing and forgotten nothing.

  There's nothing like being used to a thing.

Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751-1816): The Rivals. Act v. Sc. 3.

  It is better to have a little than nothing.

Publius Syrus (42 b c): Maxim 484.

A man so various, that he seem'd to be

Not one, but all mankind's epitome;

Stiff in opinions, always in the wrong,

Was everything by starts, and nothing long;

But in the course of one revolving moon

Was chymist, fiddler, statesman, and buffoon.

John Dryden (1631-1701): Absalom and Achitophel. Part i. Line 545.

  It is a maxim universally agreed upon in agriculture, that nothing must be done too late; and again, that everything must be done at its proper season; while there is a third precept which reminds us that opportunities lost can never be regained.

Pliny The Elder (23-79 a d): Natural History. Book xviii. Sect. 44.

  There is nothing new except what is forgotten.

Full fathom five thy father lies;

Of his bones are coral made;

Those are pearls that were his eyes:

Nothing of him that doth fade

But doth suffer a sea-change

Into something rich and strange.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): The Tempest. Act i. Sc. 2.

Rich windows that exclude the light,

And passages that lead to nothing.

Thomas Gray (1716-1771): A Long Story.

Oft times nothing profits more

Than self-esteem, grounded on just and right

Well manag'd.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book viii. Line 571.

One swallowe prouveth not that summer is neare.—Northbrooke: Treatise against Dancing. 1577.

  A Frenchman must be always talking, whether he knows anything of the matter or not; an Englishman is content to say nothing when he has nothing to say.

Samuel Johnson (1709-1784): Life of Johnson (Boswell). Vol. vii. Chap. x.

  Do nothing secretly; for Time sees and hears all things, and discloses all.

Sophocles (496-406 b c): Hipponous. Frag. 280.

  There is nothing settled in manners, but the laws of behaviour yield to the energy of the individual.

Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803-1882): Essays. Second Series. Manners.

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more,

Or close the wall up with our English dead!

In peace there's nothing so becomes a man

As modest stillness and humility;

But when the blast of war blows in our ears,

Then imitate the action of the tiger:

Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): King Henry V. Act iii. Sc. 1.

  Nothing is so difficult but that it may be found out by seeking.

Terence (185-159 b c): Heautontimoroumenos. Act iv. Sc. 2, 8. (675.)

  Avoid shame, but do not seek glory,—nothing so expensive as glory.

Sydney Smith (1769-1845): Lady Holland's Memoir. Vol. i. p. 88.

  Nothing is so dear and precious as time.

Martin Luther (1483-1546): Works. Book v. Chapter v.

  They are as sick that surfeit with too much, as they that starve with nothing.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): The Merchant of Venice. Act i. Sc. 2.

Nothing succeeds like success.

A Poet, Naturalist, and Historian,

Who left scarcely any style of writing untouched,

And touched nothing that he did not adorn.

Samuel Johnson (1709-1784): Epitaph on Goldsmith.

Il dolce far niente (The sweet do nothing).—A well known Italian proverb.

The world knows nothing of its greatest men.

Sir Henry Taylor (1800-18—): Philip Van Artevelde. Part i. Act i. Sc. 5.

Good name in man and woman, dear my lord,

Is the immediate jewel of their souls:

Who steals my purse steals trash; 't is something, nothing;

'T was mine, 't is his, and has been slave to thousands;

But he that filches from me my good name

Robs me of that which not enriches him

And makes me poor indeed.

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

'T is not for nothing that we life pursue;

It pays our hopes with something still that's new.

John Dryden (1631-1701): Aurengzebe. Act iv. Sc. 1.

Man is his own star; and the soul that can

Render an honest and a perfect man

Commands all light, all influence, all fate.

Nothing to him falls early, or too late.

Our acts our angels are, or good or ill,

Our fatal shadows that walk by us still.

John Fletcher (1576-1625): Upon an "Honest Man's Fortune."

  "Our armies swore terribly in Flanders," cried my Uncle Toby, "but nothing to this."

Laurence Sterne (1713-1768): Tristram Shandy (orig. ed.). Vol. iii. Chap. xi.

Nothing is here for tears, nothing to wail

Or knock the breast, no weakness, no contempt,

Dispraise, or blame,—nothing but well and fair,

And what may quiet us in a death so noble.

John Milton (1608-1674): Samson Agonistes. Line 1721.

  There is nothing to write about, you say. Well, then, write and let me know just this,—that there is nothing to write about; or tell me in the good old style if you are well. That's right. I am quite well.

Pliny The Younger (61-105 a d): Letters. Book i. Letter xi. 1.

Triumphs for nothing and lamenting toys

Is jollity for apes and grief for boys.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): Cymbeline. Act iv. Sc. 2.

This world is all a fleeting show,

For man's illusion given;

The smiles of joy, the tears of woe,

Deceitful shine, deceitful flow,—

There's nothing true but Heaven.

Thomas Moore (1779-1852): This World is all a fleeting Show.

  We desire nothing so much as what we ought not to have.

Publius Syrus (42 b c): Maxim 559.

Nothing will come of nothing.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): King Lear. Act i. Sc. 1.

I do know of these

That therefore only are reputed wise

For saying nothing.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): The Merchant of Venice. Act i. Sc. 1.

  Wise men say nothing in dangerous times.

John Selden (1584-1654): Table Talk. Wisdom.

  I remember a passage in Goldsmith's "Vicar of Wakefield," which he was afterwards fool enough to expunge: "I do not love a man who is zealous for nothing." . . . . There was another fine passage too which he struck out: "When I was a young man, being anxious to distinguish myself, I was perpetually starting new propositions. But I soon gave this over; for I found that generally what was new was false."

Samuel Johnson (1709-1784): Life of Johnson (Boswell). Vol. vii. Chap. viii. 1779.