“Grant them removed, and grant that this your noiseHath chid down all the majesty of England;Imagine that you see the wretched strangers,Their babies at their backs and their poor luggage,Plodding to the ports and coasts for transportation,And that you sit as kings in your desires,Authority quite silent by your brawl,And you in ruff of your opinions clothed;What had you got? I'll tell you: you had taughtHow insolence and strong hand should prevail,How order should be quelled; and by this patternNot one of you should live an aged man,For other ruffians, as their fancies wrought,With self same hand, self reasons, and self right,Would shark on you, and men like ravenous fishesWould feed on one another....Say now the kingShould so much come too short of your great trespassAs but to banish you, whither would you go?What country, by the nature of your error,Should give your harbour? go you to France or Flanders,To any German province, to Spain or Portugal, Nay, any where that not adheres to England,Why, you must needs be strangers: would you be pleasedTo find a nation of such barbarous temper,That, breaking out in hideous violence,Would not afford you an abode on earth,Whet their detested knives against your throats,Spurn you like dogs, and like as if that GodOwed not nor made you, nor that the claimantsWere not all appropriate to your comforts,But chartered unto them, what would you thinkTo be thus used? this is the strangers case;And this your mountainish inhumanity.”

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About William Shakespeare

English playwright, poet and actor

William Shakespeare was an English playwright, poet, and actor. He is widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the leading dramatist of the world stage. Often called England’s national poet and the Bard of Avon, he remains a central figure in English literature. His surviving work includes about 39 plays, 154 sonnets, and three long narrative poems, along with a few other verses, some of uncertain authorship. His plays have been translated into every major living language and are performed more often than those of any other playwright. His influence on English writing and drama has lasted for centuries, and his works continue to be studied and reinterpreted.

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Books by William Shakespeare

Hamlet

1950

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Macbeth

2003

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A Midsummer Night's Dream

1963

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King Lear

1963

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Julius Caesar

1684

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