Character analysis
The Sphinx
in The Second Coming by W. B. Yeats
The Sphinx appears in W. B. Yeats's visionary poem "The Second Coming" as a symbol of ancient, inhuman forces ready to reclaim power in a crumbling civilization. It remains silent and inactive within the poem; rather, it is evoked through the speaker’s prophetic vision as a "vast image" emerging from the sands of the Egyptian desert — specifically Spiritus Mundi, the collective memory of humanity. Its description is intentionally jarring: it has a lion's body and a man's head, with a "gaze blank and pitiless as the sun." This blankness is crucial to its portrayal — the Sphinx represents an indifferent, pre-moral past that neither judges nor cares, starkly contrasting with the waning Christian era. Its "slow thighs" suggest immense, unhurried strength, and its movement toward Bethlehem hints that it will overshadow the birth of Christ with something darker and more primal. The Sphinx serves as the poem's climactic image, embodying Yeats's cyclical theory of history (from A Vision): every two-thousand-year period concludes, giving rise to a new, opposing force. The creature's awakening signifies not progress but recurrence — the return of a savage, pre-rational age. Its trajectory is one of emergence: from ages of stone-cold slumber to slow, unstoppable motion, making it one of literature's most economical yet terrifying symbols of historical upheaval.
Who is The Sphinx?
The Sphinx in W. B. Yeats's "The Second Coming" serves as a visionary presence with immense symbolic significance. It appears in the second stanza when the speaker's mind is "troubled by a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi" — that collective reservoir of human memory Yeats sourced from his occult system. From this reservoir emerges a composite, unsettling figure: "A shape with lion body and the head of a man, / A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun." The lion body indicates physical dominance, while the human head suggests a stripped intelligence lacking empathy or moral awareness. This blankness of gaze is the poem's sharpest characterisation. The Sphinx neither judges, nor hates, nor desires in any recognizable human manner. It simply is — ancient, enormous, and utterly indifferent to the civilization it is about to displace.
What is The Sphinx's arc and motivation?
The Sphinx's arc within the poem's twenty-two lines unfolds with pure, unhurried emergence. It has remained dormant for twenty centuries — the duration of the Christian era — "vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle," referring to the birth of Christ that initiated the cycle nearing its end. Its "slow thighs" begin to move in the vision's closing images, propelling it inexorably toward Bethlehem. Understanding its motivation in human terms is misframed; the Sphinx operates according to Yeats's cyclical theory of history outlined in A Vision, where every two-thousand-year gyre exhausts itself and its opposite force rises. The Sphinx does not choose to awaken — it is summoned by historical necessity. Its trajectory is not driven by ambition but by inevitability, which is precisely what renders it terrifying. The poem presents no chance for negotiation or resistance.
What are The Sphinx's key moments?
The Sphinx's existence in the poem converges into a single, sustained image occupying the final eight lines of the second stanza. Its emergence from "the sands of the desert" represents the visual climax developed in the first stanza: the falcon’s uncontrollable spiral, the unleashing of "mere anarchy," the drowning of ceremony — all conditions that allow the Sphinx to stir. The detail that "twenty centuries of stony sleep / Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle" retroactively supplies the creature with a history, indicating it was conscious enough to be disturbed by Christ's birth and has spent two millennia in restless, suppressed dormancy. Its movement toward Bethlehem in the poem's final line — "slouches towards Bethlehem to be born" — marks the moment of maximum dread, as birth signifies a new era, not the destruction of the old, but replacement with something pre-moral and savage.
What are The Sphinx's most important relationships?
With the Rough Beast: The two figures are best understood as a single entity described from two perspectives. The Sphinx represents the seen image — the visual hallucination granted by Spiritus Mundi — while the Rough Beast is the interpretive label the speaker assigns to what that image does. Together, they create a composite portrait: ancient hybrid form paired with deliberate, purposeful movement toward a sacred site.
With the Falconer: The Falconer embodies a controlling center — human mastery, divine authority, or both — whose collapse is announced in the poem's opening line. The Sphinx's awakening results directly from that collapse. Where the Falconer’s voice once provided the world with coherent hierarchy, silence and vacancy now prevail, with the Sphinx filling that vacancy effortlessly.
With the Falcon: The falcon’s widening gyre signals the poem’s initial disorder, while the Sphinx stands as the ultimate destination of that disorder. The poem transitions structurally from human chaos — a bird out of control — to inhuman consequence — an ancient force in deliberate motion. The falcon’s frenetic energy and the Sphinx’s glacial slowness reflect and counterbalance each other, framing the poem as a parable illustrating cause and apocalyptic effect.
How is The Sphinx connected to the other characters?
- The Rough Beast
The Sphinx and the Rough Beast are widely interpreted as the same entity or as overlapping manifestations of the same apocalyptic force. The Sphinx is the image the speaker sees in the vision, while the Rough Beast is the name given to what is slouching toward Bethlehem to be born — the two descriptions together form a single, composite symbol of the new, terrifying era about to commence.
- The Falconer
The Falconer represents the lost center of the old order — the controlling human or divine authority whose voice can no longer be heard. The Sphinx's awakening is the direct consequence of that loss of control: as the Falconer's authority dissolves, the ancient, pitiless force embodied by the Sphinx stirs from its desert sleep, filling the vacuum left behind.
- The Falcon
The Falcon's widening gyre — its uncontrollable flight away from the Falconer — sets the poem's crisis in motion. This breakdown of order and hierarchy is precisely the condition that allows the Sphinx to rise; the falcon's chaos in the opening lines is answered by the Sphinx's slow, dreadful emergence in the closing lines, structuring the poem as a movement from human disorder to inhuman consequence.
Questions readers ask about The Sphinx
What does the Sphinx look like in 'The Second Coming'?
The Sphinx is described as 'a shape with lion body and the head of a man, / a gaze blank and pitiless as the sun.' The lion body signals raw physical dominance, while the human head implies a cold, stripped intelligence entirely free of empathy or moral sense. That blankness of gaze is the poem's sharpest detail: the Sphinx does not hate or judge — it simply exists, ancient and utterly indifferent to the civilization it is about to displace.
Where does the Sphinx come from in the poem?
The Sphinx emerges from Spiritus Mundi — Yeats's term for the collective reservoir of human memory — appearing to the speaker as a 'vast image out of' that shared psychic archive. Visually, it rises from 'the sands of the desert,' situating it in the Egyptian landscape and linking it to a pre-Christian, stone-cold antiquity that long predates the era it is now about to replace.
How long has the Sphinx been dormant, and why does it awaken?
The Sphinx has slept for twenty centuries — the full span of the Christian era — kept in 'stony sleep' that was 'vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle,' a reference to the birth of Christ that initiated the current historical cycle. It does not choose to awaken; within Yeats's cyclical theory of history from A Vision, every two-thousand-year gyre exhausts itself and its opposing force rises automatically, summoned by historical inevitability rather than personal will.
What is the Sphinx's relationship to the Rough Beast in the poem?
The Sphinx and the Rough Beast are best understood as a single entity described from two angles. The Sphinx is the seen image — the visual hallucination granted by Spiritus Mundi — while the Rough Beast is the interpretive label the speaker assigns to what that image does, namely slouch toward Bethlehem. Together they form one composite symbol of the savage new era about to commence.
How is the Sphinx connected to the Falconer?
The Falconer embodies the controlling center of the old order — the human or divine authority whose voice can no longer be heard — and the Sphinx's awakening is the direct consequence of that authority's collapse. Where the Falconer once imposed coherent hierarchy on the world, silence and vacancy now prevail, and the Sphinx fills that vacuum effortlessly, without resistance or negotiation.
What is the significance of the Sphinx 'slouching towards Bethlehem'?
The Sphinx's movement toward Bethlehem is the poem's moment of maximum dread, inverting the Christian Nativity: rather than a divine birth renewing the world, an ancient, pre-moral force arrives to replace it. Yeats frames this not as destruction but as replacement — a new era, darker and more primal, is about to be born. The word 'slouches' amplifies the horror through its suggestion of unhurried, unstoppable physical mass.
Is the Sphinx evil or malevolent in 'The Second Coming'?
The Sphinx is not evil in any conventional sense — it is defined by moral vacancy rather than malevolence, which Yeats uses to make it more, not less, terrifying. Its 'blank and pitiless' gaze means it neither judges nor desires nor hates; it operates purely according to historical inevitability. This indifference strips away any possibility of appeal, resistance, or negotiation, rendering the creature a symbol of catastrophe beyond human moral categories.
What does the Sphinx's 'slow thighs' detail tell us about how Yeats portrays power?
The phrase 'slow thighs' conveys immense, unhurried strength — power so overwhelming that speed is irrelevant to it. Yeats constructs the Sphinx as a force that performs no violent acts and speaks no words within the poem, yet radiates total dominance through restraint, glacial movement, and sheer scale. This deliberate slowness contrasts directly with the falcon's frenetic, uncontrolled gyring in the opening lines, framing the poem as a movement from human chaos to inhuman, inevitable consequence.
Use this in your essay
Indifference as horror: Argue that the Sphinx's "blank and pitiless" gaze is more unsettling than active malevolence
explore how Yeats uses moral vacancy rather than evil to characterise historical catastrophe.
The body as symbol: Analyse the significance of the lion-and-man hybrid
how does the combination of animal power and human cognition devoid of conscience critique modernity or a post-Christian world?
Cyclical history and political anxiety: Employ Yeats's *A Vision* framework to argue that the Sphinx represents Yeats's ambivalence toward democratic revolution and the breakdown of aristocratic order in post-WWI Europe.
Passivity and power: The Sphinx speaks no words and performs no violent acts within the poem
construct a thesis about how Yeats conveys overwhelming force through restraint, slowness, and silence.
Bethlehem as contested space: Examine the Sphinx's movement toward Bethlehem as a direct inversion of the Nativity
what does Yeats suggest about the relationship between the sacred and the cyclical, or between Christianity and the forces it temporarily suppressed?