Polonius - Famous Lines

Famous Lines

Polonius's most famous lines are found in Act 1, Scene 3, when he gives advice to his son Laertes in the form of sententious maxims: "To thine own self be true," as well as other phrases still in use today, such as "Neither a borrower nor a lender be" and enduring paraphrased aphorisms as: “Clothes make the man”; and “Old friends are the best friends.” Among his famous lines are also the lines: "Brevity is the soul of wit"; and "Though this be madness, yet there is method in't." found in Act 2, Scene 2.

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Famous quotes containing the words famous and/or lines:

    Lizzie Borden took an axe
    And gave her mother forty whacks;
    When she saw what she had done,
    She gave her father forty-one.
    —Anonymous. Late 19th century ballad.

    The quatrain refers to the famous case of Lizzie Borden, tried for the murder of her father and stepmother on Aug. 4, 1892, in Fall River, Massachusetts. Though she was found innocent, there were many who contested the verdict, occasioning a prodigious output of articles and books, including, most recently, Frank Spiering’s Lizzie (1985)

    Your letter is come; it came indeed twelve lines ago, but I
    could not stop to acknowledge it before, & I am glad it did not
    arrive till I had completed my first sentence, because the
    sentence had been made since yesterday, & I think forms a very
    good beginning.
    Jane Austen (1775–1817)