The Sonnets

CXXIX

William Shakespeare


THE EXPENSE of spirit in a waste of shame
Is lust in action: and till action, lust
Is perjur’d, murderous, bloody, full of blame,
Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust;
Enjoy’d no sooner but despised straight;
Past reason hunted; and no sooner had,
Past reason hated, as a swallow’d bait,
On purpose laid to make the taker mad:
Mad in pursuit and in possession so;
Had, having, and in quest, to have extreme;
A bliss in proof,—and prov’d, a very woe;
Before, a joy propos’d; behind a dream.
    All this the world well knows; yet none knows well
    To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell.


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