To the modern ear it means that you are healthier and happier when you act according to your own personal convictions and beliefs rather than acting to please others. This is a nice sentiment, but much harder to do than to say. Life is filled with compromizes, and we have to follow many rules and conventions that we may not agree with. As issues become more and more crucial, we have to decide how much ground we are willing to give. In life and death situations, the persons are rare who are willing to put their lives at risk in support of a deeply held conviction.
Thinking about it in this way, Shakespeare's use of the line in Polonius' advice to Laertes [Hamlet] is richly ironic. Polonius has more in mind that being 'true' is being devoted to one's self-interests, in sharp contrast to the more idealistic interpretation above. So being 'true' may in fact involve acting in ways to please others, if doing so advances one's own goals or status.
To the modern ear it means that you are healthier and happier when you act according to your own personal convictions and beliefs rather than acting to please others. This is a nice sentiment, but much harder to do than to say. Life is filled with compromizes, and we have to follow many rules and conventions that we may not agree with. As issues become more and more crucial, we have to decide how much ground we are willing to give. In life and death situations, the persons are rare who are willing to put their lives at risk in support of a deeply held conviction.
Thinking about it in this way, Shakespeare's use of the line in Polonius' advice to Laertes [Hamlet] is richly ironic. Polonius has more in mind that being 'true' is being devoted to one's self-interests, in sharp contrast to the more idealistic interpretation above. So being 'true' may in fact involve acting in ways to please others, if doing so advances one's own goals or status.
yes
To thine own self be true: היה נכון לעצמך (heyeh nachon le'atsmecha)
The quote "To thine own self be true" was written by Shakespeare. This appears in a speech by Polonius in Hamlet. This is NOT in the Bible.
In the quotation 'To thine own self be true' thine is used for the word 'your'. It says 'Be true to yourself'.
Hamlet
He's showing his true colors. To thine own self be true.
Translating to contemporary English "Be true to yourself."
"This above all: to thine own self be true,/And it must follow, as the night the day,/Thou cans't not be false to any man " --- Shakespeare in his play Hamlet
Grammar. "Thine" is used before a word beginning with a vowel (like the difference between "a" and "an"). Shakespeare wrote "thine," of course. (Elizabethan grammar was a flexible thing, but not in this case.)
"Know thyself" is an ancient aphorism of uncertain authorship. "To thine own self be true is said by the fictional character Polonius in the play Hamlet, by William Shakespeare.
90210 - 2008 To Thine Own Self Be True 2-10 is rated/received certificates of: Netherlands:6 USA:TV-14
Thine Own Self was created on 1994-02-14.