Shakespeare (Arnold)
From Wikisource
| ←To a Friend | Shakespeare by Sonnets (1849) |
Written in Emerson's Essays→ |
| Third in a series of ten sonnets by Matthew Arnold. |
Others abide our question. Thou art free.
We ask and ask — thou smilest and art still,
Out-topping knowledge. For the loftiest hill,
Who to the stars uncrowns his majesty,
Planting his stedfast footsteps in the sea,
Making the heaven of heavens his dwelling-place,
Spares but the cloudy border of his base
To the foiled searching of mortality;
And thou, who didst the stars and sunbeams know,
Self-schooled, self-scanned, self-honoured, self-secure,
Didst tread on earth unguessed at — better so!
All pains the immortal spirit must endure,
All weakness which impairs, all griefs which bow,
Find their sole speech in that victorious brow.
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This work published before January 1, 1923 is in the public domain worldwide because the author died at least 100 years ago. |
