Volume Ii Part 173 (1/2)

Never believe, though in my nature reigned All frailties that besiege all kinds of blood, That it could so preposterously be stained To leave for nothing all thy sum of good!

For nothing this wide universe I call, Save thou, my rose: in it thou art my all.

CXVI Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove: O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark That looks on tempests, and is never shaken; It is the star to every wandering bark, Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.

Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks Within his bending sickle's compa.s.s come; Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom: If this be error, and upon me proved, I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

Cx.x.x My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red than her lips' red; If snow be white, why then her b.r.e.a.s.t.s are dun; If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head.

I have seen roses damasked, red and white, But no such roses see I in her cheeks; And in some perfumes is there more delight Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.

I love to hear her speak,--yet well I know That music hath a far more pleasing sound; I grant I never saw a G.o.ddess go,-- My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground: And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare As any she belied with false compare.

CXLVI Poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth, Pressed by these rebel powers that thee array, Why dost thou pine within and suffer dearth, Painting thy outward walls so costly gay?

Why so large cost, having so short a lease, Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend?

Shall worms, inheritors of this excess, Eat up thy charge? Is this thy body's end?

Then, soul, live thou upon thy servant's loss, And let that pine to aggravate thy store; Buy terms divine in selling hours of dross; Within be fed, without be rich no more: So shalt thou feed on Death, that feeds on men; And Death once dead, there's no more dying then.

William Shakespeare [1564-1616]

”ALEXIS, HERE SHE STAYED”

Alexis, here she stayed; among these pines, Sweet hermitress, she did alone repair; Here did she spread the treasure of her hair, More rich than that brought from the Colchian mines.

She set her by these musked eglantines, The happy place the print seems yet to bear; Her voice did sweeten here thy sugared lines, To which winds, trees, beasts, birds, did lend their ear.

Me here she first perceived, and here a morn Of bright carnations did o'erspread her face; Here did she sigh, here first my hopes were born, And I first got a pledge of promised grace: But, ah! what served it to be happy so, Since pa.s.sed pleasures double but new woe?

William Drummond [1585-1649]

”WERE I AS BASE AS IS THE LOWLY PLAIN”

Were I as base as is the lowly plain, And you, my love, as high as heaven above, Yet should the thoughts of me, your humble swain, Ascend to heaven in honor of my love.

Were I as high as heaven above the plain, And you, my love, as humble and as low As are the deepest bottoms of the main, Wheresoe'er you were, with you my love should go.

Were you the earth, dear love, and I the skies, My love should s.h.i.+ne on you, like to the sun, And look upon you with ten thousand eyes, Till heaven waxed blind and till the world were done.

Wheresoe'er I am,--below, or else above you,-- Wheresoe'er you are, my heart shall truly love you.

Joshua Sylvester [1563-1618]

A SONNET OF THE MOON

Look how the pale Queen of the silent night Doth cause the ocean to attend upon her, And he, as long as she is in his sight, With his full tide is ready her to honor: But when the silver wagon of the Moon Is mounted up so high he cannot follow, The sea calls home his crystal waves to moan, And with low ebb doth manifest his sorrow.

So you that are the sovereign of my heart, Have all my joys attending on your will, My joys low-ebbing when you do depart, When you return, their tide my heart doth fill.

So as you come, and as you do depart, Joys ebb and flow within my tender heart.

Charles Best [fl. 1602]

TO MARY UNWIN