QUOTES FROM THE BARD

PLAY: The Merchant of Venice
ACT/SCENE: 5.1
SPEAKER: Portia
CONTEXT:
PORTIA
That light we see is burning in my hall.
How far that little candle throws his beams!
So shines a good deed in a naughty world.
NERISSA
When the moon shone we did not see the candle.
PORTIA
So doth the greater glory dim the less.
A substitute shines brightly as a king
Until a king be by, and then his state
Empties itself, as doth an inland brook
Into the main of waters. Music, hark.

DUTCH:
Dat licht daar, dat wij zien, brandt in de zaal;
Hoe verre licht die kleine kaars! zoo straalt
Een goede daad in deze booze wereld.

MORE:
CITED IN US LAW:
Maier v. Secretary of the Air Force, 754 F. 2d 973, 980 n.6 (Fed. Cir. 1985) (Markey, C.J.): “A federal court has now ordered the Air Force to do far more, i.e., to reenlist Maier as of 1977, with the promotions, longevity pay, and six-year earlier retirement she would have received if she had never been discharged.*
*So shines a good deed in a naughty world. Shakespeare, The Merchant of Venice, V, i, 90.”

Topics: emotion and mood, misquoted