Open Source Shakespeare

Sonnets

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Act I, Scene 94

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  • Shakespeare. They that have power to hurt and will do none,
    That do not do the thing they most do show,
    Who, moving others, are themselves as stone, 1305
    Unmoved, cold, and to temptation slow,
    They rightly do inherit heaven's graces
    And husband nature's riches from expense;
    They are the lords and owners of their faces,
    Others but stewards of their excellence. 1310
    The summer's flower is to the summer sweet,
    Though to itself it only live and die,
    But if that flower with base infection meet,
    The basest weed outbraves his dignity:
    For sweetest things turn sourest by their deeds; 1315
    Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds.