Grocott & Ward, comps. Grocott’s Familiar Quotations, 6th ed. 189-?.
Mercy
Sweet mercy is nobility’s true badge.
Shakespeare.—Titus Andronicus, Act I. Scene 2.
Mercy to him that shows it, is the rule.
Cowper.—The Task, Book VI. Line 595.
Mercy is not itself, that oft looks so;
Pardon is still the nurse of second woe.
Shakespeare.—Measure for Measure, Act II. Scene 1.
The gates of mercy shall be all shut up.
Shakespeare.—King Henry V., Act III. Scene 3.
Not the king’s crown, nor the deputed sword,
The marshal’s truncheon, nor the judge’s robe,
Become them with one-half so good a grace
As mercy does.
Shakespeare.—Measure for Measure, Act II. Scene 2.
Then, everlasting Love, restrain thy will;
’Tis godlike to have power, but not to kill.
Beaumont and Fletcher.—The Chances, Act II. Scene 2.
The quality of Mercy is not strain’d;
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath: it is twice bless’d;
It blesseth him that gives, and him that takes;
’Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown.
Shakespeare.—Merchant of Venice, Act IV. Scene 1.
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings,
It is an attribute to God himself;
An earthly power doth then show likest God’s,
When mercy seasons justice.
Shakespeare.—Merchant of Venice, Act IV. Scene 1.
There is no more mercy in him than there is milk in a male tiger.
Shakespeare.—Coriolanus, Act V. Scene 4.
Betwixt the stirrup and the ground,
Mercy I asked, I mercy found.
Camden’s Remains.—Quoted by Malone in Boswell’s Johnson, Vol. IV. Page 225, 5th Edition, improved by the Doctor as follows:—
Between the stirrup and the ground,
I mercy ask’d, I mercy found.
We do pray for mercy;
And that same prayer doth teach us all to render
The deeds of mercy.
Shakespeare.—Merchant of Venice, Act IV. Scene 1.
Mercy stood in the cloud with eye that wept
Essential love.
Pollok.—The Course of Time, Book III.
I am content to spare the living for the sake of the dead.
Cæsar to the Envoys sent to propitiate him after the Battle of Pharsalia.