A Fragment on Lust

William Shakespeare (1564-1616)

CXXXIX

The expense of the spirit in a waste of shame

                       Is lust in action; and till action, lust

Is perjured, murderous, bloody, full of blame,

                       Savage, extreme, rude, cruel, not to trust;

Enjoyed no sooner, but despised straight;

                       Past reason hated, as a swallowed bait,

On purpose laid to make the maker mad;

                       Had, having, and in quest to have, extreme;

A bliss in proof,--and proved, a very woe;

                       Before, a joy proposed; behind a dream:

All this the world well knows; yet none knows well

                       To shun the heaven that leads men to this hell.  

Comment:

I doubt that Shakespeare was born again, though I would be delighted if he knew and walked with Christ. Even so, there are two great benefits to this poem:

The first is a biblically informed, beautiful, and accurate meditation on the destructive nature of the passions and the conscience’s knowledge of lust. Each of us is aware that we want things that we ought not to want. 

These desires are liars from the moment we contemplate them; they are the foundation of all lies, murder, and cause wholesome shame. Civilization and all of its benefits are undermined by the pursuit of them, and they endanger all human relationships. 

The moment we consume the delicacy (Ps. 141:4), we recognize that we have acted unreasonably and we are enmeshed in cascade of tensions, stupidity, and purposeful manipulation to extract ourselves from the consequences. We hate ourselves for the consuming, but we know that will want the thing again and more. Further, the “passing pleasure of sin” (Heb. 11:23) will only increase our desire for more until we and all that we love are destroyed. 

Second, this poem illustrates beautifully the common grace element of the Western tradition’s meditation on coveting or lust. Both of Shakespeare’s traditions, the Christian and the pagan philosophers—as meditated through Plato and Aristotle and even the more careful Epicureans—, understood that human appetites were potentially destructive to the individual and the wider society.

Because the West has denied the truth of both Scripture and the pagan philosophers, two things await us—social chaos and tyranny. If we will not allow God to rule we must deny reason, and if we deny reason and God, nothing awaits us but a hellish earth and in eternity the Lake of Fire. 

Application: 

Press this sonnet against your heart. Allow it to inform and strengthen your conscience, sensibilities, and life. Our intellects have the power to observe and restrain the appetites by redirecting, reformulating, and replacing them. 

If you are a Christian the Spirit of God is within to help you, but he requires that you both cooperate with him (Gal. 5:25) and call upon him for assistance (Ps. 101:2). The Spirit of God works both subconsciously and through the formation of the intellect in conformity to the Scriptures. And so while he waits ready to help you overcome; the means that he offers are faith and conscience conformity to his word. 

My non-Christian friends, you know this sonnet is true. History and current observation prove the human appetite unlimited. An infinite hunger within a finite being is only extinguished on two conditions: death or by being satisfied with God. This is the spiritual seed of death is within the human heart or mind which combines with the biological. We destroy ourselves because of what we want. I ask you to reconsider the claims of Christianity.

If you will not be satisfied with God, please consider channeling your passions through the ethical systems and teaching of the more sober-minded philosophers like Plato, Aristotle, the Stoics, and Kant. They can teach you to suppress your hunger and offer some pale imitation of the Divine.