(from Troilus and Cressida , spoken by Ulysses)

Time hath, my lord, a wallet at his back,



Wherein he puts alms for oblivion,



A great-sized monster of ingratitudes:



Those scraps are good deeds past; which are devour'd



As fast as they are made, forgot as soon



As done: perseverance, dear my lord,



Keeps honour bright: to have done is to hang



Quite out of fashion, like a rusty mail



In monumental mockery. Take the instant way;



For honour travels in a strait so narrow,



Where one but goes abreast: keep then the path;



For emulation hath a thousand sons



That one by one pursue: if you give way,



Or hedge aside from the direct forthright,



Like to an enter'd tide, they all rush by



And leave you hindmost;



Or like a gallant horse fall'n in first rank,



Lie there for pavement to the abject rear,



O'er-run and trampled on: then what they do in present,



Though less than yours in past, must o'ertop yours;



For time is like a fashionable host



That slightly shakes his parting guest by the hand,



And with his arms outstretch'd, as he would fly,



Grasps in the comer: welcome ever smiles,



And farewell goes out sighing. O, let not virtue seek



Remuneration for the thing it was;



For beauty, wit,



High birth, vigour of bone, desert in service,



Love, friendship, charity, are subjects all



To envious and calumniating time.



One touch of nature makes the whole world kin,



That all with one consent praise new-born gawds,



Though they are made and moulded of things past,



And give to dust that is a little gilt



More laud than gilt o'er-dusted.



The present eye praises the present object.



Then marvel not, thou great and complete man,



That all the Greeks begin to worship Ajax;



Since things in motion sooner catch the eye



Than what not stirs. The cry went once on thee,



And still it might, and yet it may again,



If thou wouldst not entomb thyself alive



And case thy reputation in thy tent;



Whose glorious deeds, but in these fields of late,



Made emulous missions 'mongst the gods themselves

