Sonnet 94 Hypocrisy Quotes

Okay so here's a question: if you have the power to hurt, do you have an obligation to show it? You know, so that people will know what they're getting themselves into?

Here we get another example of the powerful people's hypocrisy. Isn't it creepy to think about somebody who can "move" other people emotionally, but remains cold, "as stone" on the inside? Sounds like an evil villain to Shmoop.

Is the description purely negative? Isn't the ability to resist "temptation" a good thing? It looks like Shakespeare doesn't want to give us any easy answers, but at least this line reminds us that these powerful people have some good traits, despite the fact that they've got the power to hurt us.

What does it mean to be the "lord and owner" of your own face? Doesn't that sound like you have the ability to control it, to keep it from showing any emotion that you don't want the world to see? And if you're trying to show something different to the world than what's on the inside, doesn't that make you hypocritical?

Even though they don't say so explicitly, the context of Sonnet 94 as a whole makes it a safe bet that these two lines are actually about people. Basically, they are both saying that the most beautiful people turn into the ugliest people of all when they do ugly things. The question is this: when beautiful people do ugly things, does this mean that they have changed their nature and become ugly, or is it that they were ugly all along and just happened to have finally spilled the beans? Either way, they risk hypocrisy.