How Far That Little Candle Throws His Beams.

“How far that little candle throws his beams! So shines a good deed in a weary world.”



—The Merchant of Venice,

Act VI, Scene 1.



Shakespeare was talking about an optical effect people noticed even in his time. When you light a small candle in a brightly-lit room, you hardly even notice it. But when you light it in a place like a pitch dark cathedral it literally seems to light up the whole room. A good deed does that in a weary world he said.