Falstaff says, in 1 Henry IV. ii. 4,—
For though the camomile, the more it is trodden on, the faster it grows, yet youth, the more it is wasted, the sooner it wears.
Shakspeare evidently here parodied an expression in Sir John Lyly’s Euphues:—
Though the camomile, the more it is trodden and pressed downe, the more it spreadeth; yet the violet, the oftener it is handled and touched, the sooner it withereth and decaieth.
Two verses in Titus Andronicus appear to have pleased Shakspeare so well that he twice subsequently closely copied them:—
She is a woman, therefore may be wooed,
She is a woman, therefore may be won.—Titus Andron. II. 1.
She’s beautiful, and therefore to be wooed;
She is a woman, therefore to be won.—First Part Henry VI., V. 3.