William Shakespeare (c. 1564 [?] – 1616)
“If then true lovers have been ever crossed,
It stands as an edict in destiny:
Then let us teach our trial patience,
Because it is a customary cross,
As due to love as thoughts and dreams and sighs,
Wishes and tears, poor Fancy’s followers.”
- From William Shakespeare’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream (Act I, scene 1, approximately line 150). The edition used here is the Wolfgang Clemen and Sylvan Barnet version (Signet Classic/New American Library, 1963, 1964).
