All is well that endes well.

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

The old oaken bucket, the iron-bound bucket,

The moss-covered bucket, which hung in the well.

Samuel Woodworth (1785-1842): The Old Oaken Bucket.

What is well done is done soon enough.

Du Bartas (1544-1590): First Week, First Day.

'T is well said again,

And 't is a kind of good deed to say well:

And yet words are no deeds.

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

Speak gently! 't is a little thing

Dropp'd in the heart's deep well;

The good, the joy, that it may bring

Eternity shall tell.

G. W. Langford: Speak gently.

A man's ingress into the world is naked and bare,

His progress through the world is trouble and care;

And lastly, his egress out of the world, is nobody knows where.

If we do well here, we shall do well there:

I can tell you no more if I preach a whole year.

John Edwin (1749-1790): The Eccentricities of John Edwin (second edition), vol. i. p. 74. London, 1791.

Were 't the last drop in the well,

As I gasp'd upon the brink,

Ere my fainting spirit fell

'T is to thee that I would drink.

Lord Byron 1788-1824: To Thomas Moore.

Nor love thy life, nor hate; but what thou liv'st

Live well: how long or short permit to heaven.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book xi. Line 553.

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.

Dan Chaucer, well of English undefyled,

On Fame's eternall beadroll worthie to be fyled.

Edmund Spenser (1553-1599): Faerie Queene. Book iv. Canto ii. St. 32.

Striving to better, oft we mar what's well.

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

He is well paid that is well satisfied.

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

Exceedingly well read.

William Shakespeare (1564-1616): King Henry IV. Part I. Act iii. Sc. 1.

'T is well said again,

And 't is a kind of good deed to say well:

And yet words are no deeds.

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

When taken,

To be well shaken.

George Colman, The Younger (1762-1836): The Newcastle Apothecary.

Fare thee well! and if forever,

Still forever fare thee well.

Lord Byron 1788-1824: Fare thee well.

'T is well to be merry and wise,

'T is well to be honest and true;

'T is well to be off with the old love

Before you are on with the new.

Lines used by Maturin as the motto to "Bertram," produced at Drury Lane, 1816.

'T is well to be merry and wise,

'T is well to be honest and true;

'T is well to be off with the old love

Before you are on with the new.

Lines used by Maturin as the motto to "Bertram," produced at Drury Lane, 1816.

'T is well to be merry and wise,

'T is well to be honest and true;

'T is well to be off with the old love

Before you are on with the new.

Lines used by Maturin as the motto to "Bertram," produced at Drury Lane, 1816.

So well to know

Her own, that what she wills to do or say

Seems wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best.

John Milton (1608-1674): Paradise Lost. Book viii. Line 548.

Throw hither all your quaint enamell'd eyes

That on the green turf suck the honied showers,

And purple all the ground with vernal flowers.

Bring the rathe primrose that forsaken dies,

The tufted crow-toe, and pale jessamine,

The white pink, and the pansy freakt with jet,

The glowing violet,

The musk-rose, and the well-attir'd woodbine,

With cowslips wan that hang the pensive head,

And every flower that sad embroidery wears.

John Milton (1608-1674): Lycidas. Line 139.

A moral, sensible, and well-bred man

Will not affront me,—and no other can.

William Cowper (1731-1800): Conversation. Line 193.

Reading what they never wrote,

Just fifteen minutes, huddle up their work,

And with a well-bred whisper close the scene.

William Cowper (1731-1800): The Task. Book ii. The Timepiece. Line 411.

Like an arrow shot

From a well-experienc'd archer hits the mark

His eye doth level at.

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

As in a theatre, the eyes of men,

After a well-graced actor leaves the stage,

Are idly bent on him that enters next,

Thinking his prattle to be tedious.

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

Well-languaged Daniel.

William Browne (1590-1645): Britannia's Pastorals. Book ii. Song 2.

Whose well-taught mind the present age surpast.

Alexander Pope (1688-1744): The Odyssey of Homer. Book vii. Line 210.

Such sights as youthful poets dream

On summer eyes by haunted stream.

Then to the well-trod stage anon,

If Jonson's learned sock be on,

Or sweetest Shakespeare, Fancy's child,

Warble his native wood-notes wild.

John Milton (1608-1674): L'Allegro. Line 129.