The Use of Maxims in Shakespeare & Scripture

A BYU professor once taught that Shakespeare used the simplest language to communicate his most important messages. Do you think that is an accurate statement?  I wondered if this theory extends to the word of God? (Perhaps that's where William got the idea.)

After comparing a handful of examples, I found some fundamental differences between the most important statements from Bill Shakespeare's works and the holy scriptures.  Bill's pithy expressions of truth always seemed to be in the form of witty comebacks.  God's words naturally stood on their own.  Bill's axioms, while self-evident and universally accepted, seemed context specific. When God taught, He used small words and familiar concepts to express complex and situation-diverse principles. While Bill invented maxims couched in mostly-fictional stories to lend his truths credibility, God didn't require adages to convince His readers.  God just laid down the truth, like a boss.  But here's the heart of the difference: Bill's truths were derived from human experience, and thusly, don't require much divination to be applied.  In order to interpret the word of God, an earnest truth-seeker must look to a divine source—the Holy Spirit—for application and meaning.

In the light of these many differences, it is safe to assume that Shakespeare did not take a page from scripture when coming up with maxims in his own writing.

Shakespearean Examples:

• "Better three hours too soon than a minute too late." (The Merry Wives of Windsor; II, ii)
• "Love all, trust a few, do wrong to none." (All's Well That Ends Well; I, i) 
• "Every one can master a grief but he that has it." (Much Ado About Nothing; III, ii)
• "If all the year were playing holidays, to sport would be as tedious as to work." (Henry V; I, ii)
• "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars, But in ourselves, that we are underlings." (Julius Caesar; I, ii)

Scriptural Examples

• "If ye love me, keep my commandments" (John 14:15).
• "For behold, this is my work and my glory—to bring to pass the immortality and eternal life of man" (Moses 1:39).
• "Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path." (Psalm 119:105)
• "Surely the Lord God will do nothing, but he revealeth his secret unto his servants the prophets" (Amos 3:7).
• "And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent" (John 17:3).
• "Jesus saith unto him, I am the away, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me" (John 14:6).
• "And it came to pass that I, Nephi, said unto my father: I will go and do the things which the Lord hath commanded, for I know that the Lord giveth no commandments unto the children of men, save he shall prepare a way for them that they may accomplish the thing which he commandeth them" (1 Nephi 3:7).
• "Cease to be idle; cease to be unclean; cease to find fault one with another; cease to sleep longer than is needful; retire to thy bed early, that ye may not be weary; arise early, that your bodies and our minds may be invigorated" (D&C 88:124).
• "Pray always, that you may come off conqueror; yea, that you may conquer Satan, and that you may escape the hands of the servants of Satan that do uphold his work" (D&C 10:5).
• "Look unto me in every thought; doubt not, fear not" (D&C 6:36).