Question

The following excerpt is taken from W.B. Yeats's poem "Easter, 1916," in which he examines his feelings toward those who took part in the Easter Rising in Ireland. Which lines suggest that Yeats considered the rebels inflexible?
Too long a sacrifice
Can make a stone of the heart.
O when may it suffice?
That is Heaven's part, our part
To murmur name upon name,
As a mother names her child
When sleep at last has come
On limbs that had run wild.
What is it but nightfall?
No, no, not night but death;
Was it needless death after all?
For England may keep faith
For all that is done and said.
We know their dream; enough
To know they dreamed and are dead;
And what if excess of love
Bewildered them till they died?
I write it out in a verse—
MacDonagh and MacBride
And Connolly and Pearse
Now and in time to be,
Wherever green is worn,
Are changed, changed utterly
A terrible beauty is born.


A. Too long a sacrifice
Can make a stone of the heart.

B. We know their dream; enough
To know they dreamed and are dead;

C. And what if excess of love
Bewildered them till they died?

D. Now and in time to be,
Wherever green is worn,
Are changed, changed utterly
A terrible beauty is born.

Answer 1

The correct option is A.
Literally, to be inflexible means to be quite unwilling  to change or to compromise. An inflexible person will not be ready to bend or be flexible in any way. To have a stone of heart means that the person is inflexible. Because of the nature of stone, a stone will remain a stone forever, it can not be changed, thus, to have a heart of stone is to be unchangeable, inflexible, uncompromising.