Mortal Coil

Mortal coil is a poetic term that means the troubles of daily life and the strife and suffering of the world. It is used in the sense of a burden to be carried or abandoned, most famously in the phrase "shuffle off this mortal coil" from the "To be, or not to be" monologue in Shakespeare's Hamlet.

Read more about Mortal Coil:  Derivation, Schopenhauer's Speculation

Famous quotes containing the word mortal:

    What quarrel, what harshness, what unbelief in each other can subsist in the presence of a great calamity, when all the artificial vesture of our life is gone, and we are all one with each other in primitive mortal needs?
    George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)