Shakespeare's Sonnets (1883)/Sonnet 59

by William Shakespeare

For other versions of this work, see Sonnet 59 (Shakespeare).

LIX.

If there be nothing new, but that which is
Hath been before, how are our brains beguil'd,
Which labouring for invention bear amiss
The second burthen of a former child!
O, that record could with a backward look,
Even of five hundred courses of the sun,
Show me your image in some antique book,
Since mind at first in character was done!
That I might see what the old world could say
To this composed wonder of your frame;
Whether we are mended, or wh'r better they,
Or whether revolution be the same.

O! sure I am the wits of former days,

To subjects worse have given admiring praise.