Academy of American Poets
View Cart | Log In 
Subscribe | More Info 
Find a Poet or Poem
Advanced Search >
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare
William Shakespeare was born on April 23, 1564, in Stratford-on-Avon. The son of...
More >
Want more poems?
Subscribe to our
Poem-A-Day emails.
Sponsor a Poet Page | Add to Notebook | Email to Friend | Print

They that have power to hurt and will do none (Sonnet 94)

 
by William 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,   
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.   
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;   
  Lilies that fester smell far worse than weeds. 



Larger TypeLarger Type | Home | Help | Contact Us | Privacy Policy Copyright © 1997 - 2013 by Academy of American Poets.