The Tempest

by William Shakespeare

I should sin To think but nobly of my grandmother: Good wombs have borne bad sons.

Knowing I lov’d my books, he furnish’d me, From mine own library with volumes that 195 I prize above my dukedom.

“Hell is empty, And all the devils are here.”

This island’s mine, by Sycorax my mother, Which thou takest from me.

You taught me language; and my profit on’t Is, I know how to curse. The red plague rid you For learning me your language!

Full fathom five thy father lies; Of his bones are coral made; Those are pearls that were his eyes: 465 Nothing of him that doth fade, But doth suffer a sea-change Into something rich and strange. Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell:

Be not afeard: the isle is full of noises, Sounds, and sweet airs, that give delight, and hurt not.

We are such stuff As dreams are made on, and our little life Is rounded with a sleep.

A devil, a born devil, on whose nature Nurture can never stick; on whom my pains, Humanely taken, all, all lost, quite lost; And as with age his body uglier grows, 210 So his mind cankers. I will plague them all, Even to roaring.

O, wonder! 205 How many goodly creatures are there here! How beauteous mankind is! O brave new world That has such people in’t!