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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/18842-8.txt b/18842-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..234ac4f --- /dev/null +++ b/18842-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3615 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Elizabethan Sonnet-Cycles, by +Samuel Daniel and Henry Constable + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Elizabethan Sonnet-Cycles + Delia - Diana + +Author: Samuel Daniel and Henry Constable + +Editor: Martha Foote Crow + +Release Date: July 16, 2006 [EBook #18842] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ELIZABETHAN SONNET-CYCLES *** + + + + +Produced by David Starner, Taavi Kalju and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + +ELIZABETHAN SONNET-CYCLES + +EDITED BY + +MARTHA FOOTE CROW + + +DELIA + +BY SAMUEL DANIEL + +DIANA + +BY HENRY CONSTABLE + + +KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRÜBNER AND CO. +PATERNOSTER HOUSE LONDON W.C. + +1896 + + + + +DELIA + +BY + +SAMUEL DANIEL + + + + +SAMUEL DANIEL + + +Daniel's sonnet series has been by many regarded as the prototype of +Shakespeare's. It is true that several of Daniel's themes are repeated +in the cycle composed by the greater poet. The ideas of immortality in +verse, the transitoriness of beauty, the assurances of truth, the +humility and the woes of the lover, the pain of separation and the +comfort of night thoughts, shape the mood of both poets. But these +motives are also found in the pages of many other sonneteers of the +time. All these devotees seem to have had a storehouse of poetic +conceits which they held in common, and from which each poet had the +right to draw materials to use in his own way. In fact Shakespeare's +sonnets are full of echoes from the voices of Sidney, Constable, Davies, +Lodge, Watson, Drayton and Barnes, as well as from that mellifluous one +of Daniel; and these poetic conceits were tossed forth in the first +place by the Italian sonnet makers, led by Petrarch. It is evident that +Daniel's _Petrarch_ has been well-thumbed. Wood says that Daniel left +Oxford without a degree because "his geny" was "more prone to easier and +smoother studies than in pecking and hewing at logic," and we may +believe that Italian was one of these smoother studies. His translation +of Paolo Giovi's work on Emblems, which was published in 1585, was +doubtless one fruit of this study, a work that since it took him into +the very realm of the _concetti_, was to be a potent influence upon his +mental growth. The main theme, the cruelty of the Fair, is the same as +that of Petrarch. Daniel follows this master in making the vale echo +with his sighs, in appealing to her hand and cruel bosom for mercy, in +recounting the number of years he has worshipped her and honored her +with sonnets on which he is depending for immortal fame, in upbraiding +her for her devotion to the mirror rather than to him, and for ensnaring +him with the golden net of her hair and transpiercing him with the +darts from her crystalline eyes. In some of Petrarch's nobler flights +Daniel does not follow; the higher teachings of love are not revealed to +him, the step from human to divine he does not take; yet in the main, +the features of the earlier poet re-appear in Daniel's verse, as they do +in most of his fellow-sonneteers, including Shakespeare. + +It is also not best to give too much weight to the opinion that +Shakespeare has been over-influenced by Daniel in the adoption of the +quatrain and couplet structure. The whole period from Wyatt to +Shakespeare shows a slow and steady mastery of the native over the +foreign tendency. The change was not a sudden leap on the part of Daniel +and Shakespeare, but a gradual growth occupying a half century and +culminating in the English form. But if we should feel convinced that +Shakespeare's memory was influenced by the sound of Daniel's cadences, +this need not be considered discreditable to Shakespeare. Daniel's lines +are smooth and melodious, and he was perhaps as great a master of the +technique of rhyme as was Shakespeare. If we take the sonnets of both +poets as criterion, the careful Daniel uses twice as many rhyme colours +as Shakespeare, while Shakespeare repeats rhymes twice as often as +Daniel. If double rhymes find less favor with the captious, we admit +that Daniel has a third more than Shakespeare has, but again Shakespeare +uses twice as many rhymes on syllables with secondary stress as does +Daniel, and Shakespeare's bad rhymes are as bad as Daniel's and more +frequent. + +Daniel's poetic powers were appreciated to the full in his time. To his +contemporaries he was the "well languaged," the "sharp conceited," one +by whose verse Rosamond was eternised, one who "divinely sonnetted his +Delia." When Judicio in _The Return from Parnassus_ makes his inventory +of poet's qualities, in giving his judgment on Daniel, he evidently has +the _Delia_ in mind. + + "Sweet honey-dropping Daniel doth wage + War with the proudest big Italian + That melts his heart in sugared sonnetting." + +If Jonson, Daniel's rival as maker of masques for the Court, proclaimed +him a good honest man but no poet, Spenser generously said he surpassed +"all that afore him came;" and scarcely one of the more prominent of his +contemporaries failed to address compliments to him. When Daniel was +gentleman extraordinary and groom of the privy chamber to Anne, +Queen-consort to James I., the Queen is said to have been a "favourer +and encourager of his muse;" and his high social position made it easy +for less favoured aspirants to praise him. But the perspective of time +brings a more balanced judgment. While Lowell finds in the fact that +Daniel was held in high esteem by his contemporaries a proof that noble +diction was appreciated then as now, and while he admits that Daniel +refined our tongue, yet he decided that Daniel had the thinking and +languaging parts of a poet's outfit but lacked the higher creative gift. +We shall find Daniel at his best, not when in prosaic soberness he sings + + "... the civil wars, tumultuous broils, + And bloody factions of a mighty land." + +not when he is framing stilted tragedies with chorus and declamation in +the grand Senecan manner, not in his complimentary addresses to lords, +ladies and royalty, nor in the classic masques and philosophical +dialogue, but in the less ambitious poems of _Delia_ and _Rosamond_, +especially in such a sonnet as "Care-charmer Sleep," where we come more +near to hearing a human heart beat than in any of the others. It is not +a mighty heart, but it is one that is gentle, tender and pure. + +A glance at the life of Daniel gives opportunity for an easy conjecture +as to the personality of the lady honoured under the name of Delia. At +seventeen Daniel was at Oxford, and finished a three years' residence at +Magdalen College in 1582. After a visit to Italy, he became established +at Wilton as tutor to the sons of Mary Sidney, Countess of Pembroke. To +those early days at Wilton the poet refers, when in 1603 he dedicates +his _Defense of Rhyme_ to William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, his former +pupil. In the introduction to this fine essay Daniel declares that in +regard to his poetic studies he was "first encouraged and framed +thereunto by your most worthy and honourable mother, and received the +first notion for the formal ordering of those compositions at Wilton +which I must ever acknowledge as my best school, and thereof always am +to hold a feeling and grateful memory." At this time the home of the +Herberts at Wilton was a literary centre. The Countess was herself an +industrious author, and the subject of innumerable dedicatory addresses. +She seems to have been as beautiful as she was gracious and gifted. In +the Penshurst picture we see her in extreme youth. The long oval and +delicate chiselling of the Sidney face are expressed in their finest +perfection, and justify the resemblance, found by Spenser, to "her +brother dear." The soft hair is of the same golden-brown as his, the +colour her eldest son inherited, and which Shakespeare is said to have +described in his figure of the marjoram-buds. In the picture by +Gheeraedts at the National Portrait Gallery, painted in 1614, she has +lost little of her youthful beauty, but has added the special graces of +maturity. The hair is still a rich brown. A thoughtful soul sits +brooding behind those attentive eyes--a soul that seems to wish to ask +the universal unanswerable questions, one that has grappled with doubt +and struggled with environing circumstance, but has not yet consented to +be baffled. The face is modern and complex. This accomplished lady +received at Wilton the most distinguished people of her time. Her guests +included Spenser, Raleigh, probably Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Inigo +Jones, Sir John Harrington, Dr. Donne, and many more; and the Countess's +_Pastoral Dialogue in Praise of Astraea_ was probably written in honour +of a visit from the Queen herself. It would perhaps be strange if the +young poet did not surround the personality of this fascinating +patroness with a romantic halo and feel that his poetic fame was linked +with hers. The Delia of the sonnets has all the excellencies that a +sonnet-honoured lady should have, including locks of gold. But the fact +that the poet has slyly changed the word "amber" to "snary" in sonnet +xiv., and "golden" to "sable" in sonnet xxxviii., looks as if he desired +to shield her personality from too blunt a guess. However, many hints +are given; she lives in the "joyful North," in "fair Albion;" she is + + "The eternal wonder of our happy Isle." + +And the river by which he sounds her name is the Avon-- + + "But Avon, poor in fame and poor in waters, + Shall have my song, where Delia hath her seat." + +The Wiltshire Avon is the proud brook that flows southward by Wilton, +"where Delia hath her seat." If it may seem in any degree unfitting that +Daniel should address language so glowing as is found in the _Delia_ +sonnets to a lady who is established as the head of a household with +husband and sons about her, attention may be called to the fact that the +sonnets, though they are characterised by warmth of feeling and +extravagance of expression, do not contain one tainted line. Posterity +must justify what Daniel in proud humility said of himself: + + "I . . . . . . . + . . . never had my harmless pen at all + Distained with any loose immodesty, + But still have done the fairest offices + To virtue and the time." + +The respectful dignity of Daniel's prose dedication of _Delia_ to Mary +Sidney cannot be surpassed; and the introductory sonnet that displaces +it in the next edition, while confessing the ardent devotion of the +writer, is yet couched in the most reverent terms. Daniel and other +sonneteers had the great example of Petrarch in honouring a lady with +admiration and love expressed in verses whose warmth might perhaps not +have been so excusable, could the poet have been taken at his word. The +new sonnets inserted in the editions of 1601 and 1623 show the +faithfulness of the poet's homage. A loyal friendship, whether formed +upon gratitude only or upon some warmer feeling, inspired the _Delia_ +although the poet expresses his devotion in the conventional modes. But +that Daniel outgrew to some extent the taste for these fanciful devices +is shown by the changes he made in successive editions. Four sonnets +from the 1591 edition were never reprinted, another was reprinted once +and afterwards omitted. In our text the order of the 1623 edition is +followed, the edition that was supervised by the poet's brother; but +these omitted sonnets will be found at the end under the head of +_Rejected Sonnets_. It is certain that they are Daniel's and that he +rejected them, and it therefore seems no more than fair to the poet, if +they are reprinted at all, to insert them under this head. + +While, then, these rejected sonnets may have been in two cases omitted +by the poet because of their too great frankness of expression, in other +cases, notably in the phoenix, the wax-image, the tablet-and-siren, the +vanquished fort, and the ermelin sonnets, they seem to have lost their +charm, not so much for any personal reason as for the artistic defect in +the far-fetched nature of the device. + +Daniel lived till 1619, experiencing the usual ups and downs in the +career of a "Court-dear poet." In later years, the famous Lady Anne +Clifford, wife of Mary Sidney's younger son, caused a monument to be +erected in his honour, in the inscription upon which she recorded her +pride in the fact that he had once been her tutor. + + + + +TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE + +THE LADY MARY + +COUNTESS OF PEMBROKE + + + Wonder of these, glory of other times, + O thou whom envy ev'n is forced t'admire! + Great Patroness of these my humble rhymes, + Which thou from out thy greatness dost inspire! + Since only thou has deigned to raise them higher, + Vouchsafe now to accept them as thine own, + Begotten by thy hand and my desire, + Wherein my zeal and thy great might is shown. + And seeing this unto the world is known, + O leave not still to grace thy work in me; + Let not the quickening seed be overthrown + Of that which may be born to honor thee, + Whereof the travail I may challenge mine, + But yet the glory, Madam, must be thine! + + +TO DELIA + +I + + Unto the boundless ocean of thy beauty + Runs this poor river, charged with streams of zeal, + Returning thee the tribute of my duty, + Which here my love, my youth, my plaints reveal. + Here I unclasp the book of my charged soul, + Where I have cast th' accounts of all my care; + Here have I summed my sighs. Here I enrol + How they were spent for thee. Look, what they are. + Look on the dear expenses of my youth, + And see how just I reckon with thine eyes. + Examine well thy beauty with my truth, + And cross my cares ere greater sums arise. + Read it, sweet maid, though it be done but slightly; + Who can show all his love, doth love but lightly. + + +II + + Go, wailing verse, the infants of my love, + Minerva-like, brought forth without a mother; + Present the image of the cares I prove, + Witness your father's grief exceeds all other. + Sigh out a story of her cruel deeds, + With interrupted accents of despair; + A monument that whosoever reads, + May justly praise and blame my loveless Fair; + Say her disdain hath drièd up my blood, + And starvèd you, in succours still denying; + Press to her eyes, importune me some good, + Waken her sleeping pity with your crying: + Knock at her hard heart, beg till you have moved her, + And tell th'unkind how dearly I have loved her. + + +III + + If so it hap this offspring of my care, + These fatal anthems, lamentable songs, + Come to their view, who like afflicted are; + Let them yet sigh their own, and moan my wrongs. + But untouched hearts with unaffected eye, + Approach not to behold my soul's distress; + Clear-sighted you soon note what is awry, + Whilst blinded souls mine errors never guess. + You blinded souls, whom youth and error lead; + You outcast eaglets dazzled with your sun, + Do you, and none but you, my sorrows read; + You best can judge the wrongs that she hath done, + That she hath done, the motive of my pain, + Who whilst I love doth kill me with disdain. + + +IV + + These plaintive verse, the posts of my desire, + Which haste for succour to her slow regard, + Bear not report of any slender fire, + Forging a grief to win a fame's reward. + Nor are my passions limned for outward hue, + For that no colours can depaint my sorrows; + Delia herself, and all the world may view + Best in my face where cares have tilled deep furrows. + No bays I seek to deck my mourning brow, + O clear-eyed rector of the holy hill! + My humble accents bear the olive bough + Of intercession but to move her will. + These lines I use t'unburden mine own heart; + My love affects no fame nor 'steems of art. + + +V + + Whilst youth and error led my wandering mind, + And set my thoughts in heedless ways to range, + All unawares a goddess chaste I find, + Diana-like, to work my sudden change. + For her, no sooner had mine eye bewrayed, + But with disdain to see me in that place, + With fairest hand the sweet unkindest maid + Casts water-cold disdain upon my face. + Which turned my sport into a hart's despair, + Which still is chased, while I have any breath, + By mine own thoughts set on me by my Fair. + My thoughts like hounds pursue me to my death; + Those that I fostered of mine own accord, + Are made by her to murder thus their lord. + + +VI + + Fair is my love, and cruel as she's fair; + Her brow shades frowns although her eyes are sunny; + Her smiles are lightning though her pride despair; + And her disdains are gall, her favours honey; + A modest maid, decked with a blush of honour, + Whose feet do tread green paths of youth and love; + The wonder of all eyes that look upon her, + Sacred on earth, designed a saint above. + Chastity and beauty, which were deadly foes, + Live reconcilèd friends within her brow; + And had she pity to conjoin with those, + Then who had heard the plaints I utter now? + O had she not been fair and thus unkind, + My Muse had slept and none had known my mind! + + +VII + + For had she not been fair and thus unkind, + Then had no finger pointed at my lightness; + The world had never known what I do find, + And clouds obscure had shaded still her brightness. + Then had no censor's eye these lines surveyed, + Nor graver brows have judged my Muse so vain; + No sun my blush and error had bewrayed, + Nor yet the world had heard of such disdain. + Then had I walked with bold erected face; + No downcast look had signified my miss; + But my degraded hopes with such disgrace + Did force me groan out griefs and utter this. + For being full, should I not then have spoken, + My sense oppressed had failed and heart had broken. + + +VIII + + Thou, poor heart, sacrificed unto the fairest, + Hast sent the incense of thy sighs to heaven; + And still against her frowns fresh vows repairest, + And made thy passions with her beauty even. + And you, mine eyes, the agents of my heart, + Told the dumb message of my hidden grief; + And oft, with careful tunes, with silent art, + Did treat the cruel Fair to yield relief. + And you, my verse, the advocates of love, + Have followed hard the process of my case: + And urged that title which doth plainly prove + My faith should win, if justice might have place. + Yet though I see that nought we do can move, + 'Tis not disdain must make me cease to love. + + +IX + + If this be love, to draw a weary breath, + To paint on floods till the shore cry to th'air; + With downward looks still reading on the earth. + These sad memorials of my love's despair; + If this be love, to war against my soul, + Lie down to wail, rise up to sigh and grieve, + The never-resting stone of care to roll, + Still to complain my griefs, whilst none relieve; + If this be love, to clothe me with dark thoughts, + Haunting untrodden paths to wail apart, + My pleasures horror, music tragic notes, + Tears in mine eyes and sorrow at my heart; + If this be love, to live a living death, + Then do I love, and draw this weary breath. + + +X + + Then do I love and draw this weary breath + For her, the cruel Fair, within whose brow + I written find the sentence of my death + In unkind letters wrote she cares not how. + Thou power that rul'st the confines of the night, + Laughter-loving goddess, worldly pleasures' queen, + Intenerate that heart that sets so light + The truest love that ever yet was seen; + And cause her leave to triumph in this wise + Upon the prostrate spoil of that poor heart + That serves, a trophy to her conquering eyes, + And must their glory to the world impart; + Once let her know sh'hath done enough to prove me, + And let her pity if she cannot love me! + + +XI + + Tears, vows and prayers gain the hardest hearts, + Tears, vows and prayers have I spent in vain; + Tears cannot soften flint nor vows convert; + Prayers prevail not with a quaint disdain. + I lose my tears where I have lost my love, + I vow my faith where faith is not regarded, + I pray in vain a merciless to move; + So rare a faith ought better be rewarded. + Yet though I cannot win her will with tears, + Though my soul's idol scorneth all my vows, + Though all my prayers be to so deaf ears, + No favour though the cruel Fair allows, + Yet will I weep, vow, pray to cruel she; + Flint, frost, disdain, wears, melts and yields, we see. + + +XII + + My spotless love hovers with purest wings + About the temple of the proudest frame, + Where blaze those lights, fairest of earthly things; + Which clear our clouded world with brightest flame. + M'ambitious thoughts, confinèd in her face, + Affect no honour but what she can give; + My hopes do rest in limits of her grace; + I weigh no comfort unless she relieve. + For she that can my heart imparadise, + Holds in her fairest hand what dearest is. + My fortune's wheel's the circle of her eyes, + Whose rolling grace deign once a turn of bliss. + All my life's sweet consists in her alone, + So much I love the most unloving one. + + +XIII + + Behold what hap Pygmalion had to frame + And carve his proper grief upon a stone! + My heavy fortune is much like the same; + I work on flint and that's the cause I moan. + For hapless lo, even with mine own desires + I figured on the table of my heart + The fairest form that the world's eye admires, + And so did perish by my proper art. + And still I toil to change the marble breast + Of her whose sweetest grace I do adore, + Yet cannot find her breathe unto my rest. + Hard is her heart, and woe is me therefore. + O happy he that joyed his stone and art! + Unhappy I, to love a stony heart! + + +XIV + + Those snary locks are those same nets, my dear, + Wherewith my liberty thou didst surprise + Love was the flame that firèd me so near, + The dart transpiercing were those crystal eyes. + Strong is the net, and fervent is the flame; + Deep is the wound my sighs can well report. + Yet I do love, adore, and praise the same, + That holds, that burns, that wounds in this sort; + And list not seek to break, to quench, to heal, + The bond, the flame, the wound that festereth so, + By knife, by liquor, or by salve to deal; + So much I please to perish in my woe. + Yet lest long travails be above my strength, + Good Delia, loose, quench, heal me, now at length! + + +XV + + If that a loyal heart and faith unfeigned, + If a sweet languish with a chaste desire, + If hunger-starven thoughts so long retained, + Fed but with smoke, and cherished but with fire; + And if a brow with care's charàcters painted + Bewray my love with broken words half spoken + To her which sits in my thoughts' temple sainted, + And lays to view my vulture-gnawn heart open; + If I have done due homage to her eyes, + And had my sighs still tending on her name, + If on her love my life and honour lies, + And she, th'unkindest maid, still scorns the same; + Let this suffice, that all the world may see + The fault is hers, though mine the hurt must be. + + +XVI + + Happy in sleep, waking content to languish, + Embracing clouds by night, in daytime mourn, + My joys but shadows, touch of truth my anguish, + Griefs ever springing, comforts never born; + And still expecting when she will relent, + Grown hoarse with crying, "mercy, mercy give," + So many vows and prayers having spent + That weary of my life I loathe to live; + And yet the hydra of my cares renews + Still new-born sorrows of her fresh disdain; + And still my hope the summer winds pursues, + Finding no end nor period of my pain; + This is my state, my griefs do touch so nearly, + And thus I live because I love her dearly. + + +XVII + + Why should I sing in verse? Why should I frame + These sad neglected notes for her dear sake? + Why should I offer up unto her name, + The sweetest sacrifice my youth can make? + Why should I strive to make her live for ever, + That never deigns to give me joy to live? + Why should m'afflicted Muse so much endeavour + Such honour unto cruelty to give? + If her defects have purchased her this fame, + What should her virtues do, her smiles, her love? + If this her worst, how should her best inflame? + What passions would her milder favours move? + Favours, I think, would sense quite overcome; + And that makes happy lovers ever dumb. + + +XVIII + + Since the first look that led me to this error, + To this thoughts' maze to my confusion tending, + Still have I lived in grief, in hope, in terror, + The circle of my sorrows never ending; + Yet cannot leave her love that holds me hateful; + Her eyes exact it, though her heart disdains me. + See what reward he hath that serves th'ungrateful? + So true and loyal love no favour gains me. + Still must I whet my young desires abated, + Upon the flint of such a heart rebelling; + And all in vain; her pride is so innated, + She yields no place at all for pity's dwelling. + Oft have I told her that my soul did love her, + And that with tears; yet all this will not move her. + + +XIX + + Restore thy tresses to the golden ore, + Yield Cytherea's son those arks of love; + Bequeath the heavens the stars that I adore, + And to the orient do thy pearls remove; + Yield thy hands' pride unto the ivory white; + T'Arabian odours give thy breathing sweet; + Restore thy blush unto Aurora bright; + To Thetis give the honour of thy feet. + Let Venus have the graces she resigned, + And thy sweet voice give back unto the spheres; + But yet restore thy fierce and cruel mind + To Hyrcan tigers and to ruthless bears; + Yield to the marble thy hard heart again; + So shalt thou cease to plague, and I to pain. + + +XX + + What it is to breathe and live without life; + How to be pale with anguish, red with fear, + T'have peace abroad, and nought within but strife: + Wish to be present, and yet shun t'appear; + How to be bold far off, and bashful near; + How to think much, and have no words to speak; + To crave redress, yet hold affliction dear; + To have affection strong, a body weak, + Never to find, yet evermore to seek; + And seek that which I dare not hope to find; + T'affect this life and yet this life disleek, + Grateful t'another, to myself unkind: + This cruel knowledge of these contraries, + Delia, my heart hath learned out of those eyes. + + +XXI + + If beauty thus be clouded with a frown, + That pity shines no comfort to my bliss, + And vapours of disdain so overgrown, + That my life's light wholly indarkened is, + Why should I more molest the world with cries, + The air with sighs, the earth below with tears, + Since I live hateful to those ruthful eyes, + Vexing with untuned moan her dainty ears! + If I have loved her dearer than my breath, + My breath that calls the heaven to witness it!-- + And still hold her most dear until my death, + And if that all this cannot move one whit, + Yet sure she cannot but must think apart + She doth me wrong to grieve so true a heart. + + +XXII + + Come Time, the anchor hold of my desire, + My last resort whereto my hopes appeal; + Cause once the date of her disdain t'exspire, + Make her the sentence of her wrath repeal. + Rob her fair brow, break in on beauty, steal + Power from those eyes which pity cannot spare; + Deal with those dainty cheeks, as she doth deal + With this poor heart consumèd with despair. + This heart made now the pròspective of care + By loving her, the cruelst fair that lives, + The cruelst fair that sees I pine for her, + And never mercy to thy merit gives. + Let her not still triumph over the prize + Of mine affections taken by her eyes. + + +XXIII + + Time, cruel Time, come and subdue that brow + Which conquers all but thee, and thee too stays, + As if she were exempt from scythe or bow, + From love or years unsubject to decays. + Or art thou grown in league with those fair eyes, + That they may help thee to consume our days? + Or dost thou spare her for her cruelties, + Being merciless like thee that no man weighs? + And yet thou seest thy power she disobeys, + Cares not for thee, but lets thee waste in vain, + And prodigal of hours and years betrays + Beauty and youth t'opinion and disdain. + Yet spare her, Time; let her exempted be; + She may become more kind to thee or me. + + +XXIV + + These sorrowing sighs, the smoke of mine annoy, + These tears, which heat of sacred flame distils, + Are those due tributes that my faith doth pay + Unto the tyrant whose unkindness kills. + I sacrifice my youth and blooming years + At her proud feet, and she respects not it; + My flower, untimely's withered with my tears, + By winter woes for spring of youth unfit. + She thinks a look may recompense my care, + And so with looks prolongs my long-looked ease; + As short that bliss, so is the comfort rare; + Yet must that bliss my hungry thoughts appease. + Thus she returns my hopes so fruitless ever; + Once let her love indeed, or eye me never! + + +XXV + + False hope prolongs my ever certain grief, + Traitor to me, and faithful to my love. + A thousand times it promised me relief, + Yet never any true effect I prove. + Oft when I find in her no truth at all, + I banish her, and blame her treachery; + Yet soon again I must her back recall, + As one that dies without her company. + Thus often, as I chase my hope from me, + Straightway she hastes her unto Delia's eyes; + Fed with some pleasing look, there shall she be, + And so sent back. And thus my fortune lies; + Looks feed my hope, hope fosters me in vain; + Hopes are unsure when certain is my pain. + + +XXVI + + Look in my griefs, and blame me not to mourn, + From care to care that leads a life so bad; + Th'orphan of fortune, born to be her scorn, + Whose clouded brow doth make my days so sad. + Long are their nights whose cares do never sleep, + Loathsome their days who never sun yet joyed; + The impression of her eyes do pierce so deep, + That thus I live both day and night annoyed. + Yet since the sweetest root yields fruit so sour, + Her praise from my complaint I may not part; + I love th'effect, the cause being of this power; + I'll praise her face and blame her flinty heart, + Whilst we both make the world admire at us, + Her for disdain, and me for loving thus. + + +XXVII + + Reignin my thoughts, fair hand, sweet eye, rare voice! + Possess me whole, my heart's triumvirate! + Yet heavy heart, to make so hard a choice + Of such as spoil thy poor afflicted state! + For whilst they strive which shall be lord of all, + All my poor life by them is trodden down; + They all erect their trophies on my fall, + And yield me nought that gives them their renown. + When back I look, I sigh my freedom past, + And wail the state wherein I present stand, + And see my fortune ever like to last, + Finding me reined with such a heavy hand. + What can I do but yield? and yield I do; + And serve all three, and yet they spoil me too! + + +XXVIII + +_Alluding to the sparrow pursued by a hawk, that flew into the bosom of +Zenocrates_ + + Whilst by thy eyes pursued, my poor heart flew + Into the sacred refuge of thy breast; + Thy rigour in that sanctuary slew + That which thy succ'ring mercy should have blest. + No privilege of faith could it protect, + Faith being with blood and five years witness signed, + Wherein no show gave cause of least suspect, + For well thou saw'st my love and how I pined. + Yet no mild comfort would thy brow reveal, + No lightning looks which falling hopes erect; + What boots to laws of succour to appeal? + Ladies and tyrants never laws respect. + Then there I die from whence my life should come, + And by that hand whom such deeds ill become. + + +XXIX + + Still in the trace of one perplexèd thought, + My ceaseless cares continually run on, + Seeking in vain what I have ever sought, + One in my love, and her hard heart still one. + I who did never joy in other sun, + And have no stars but those that must fulfil + The work of rigour, fatally begun + Upon this heart whom cruelty will kill, + Injurious Delia!--yet, I love thee still, + And will whilst I shall draw this breath of mine; + I'll tell the world that I deserved but ill, + And blame myself, t'excuse that heart of thine; + See then who sins the greater of us twain, + I in my love, or thou in thy disdain. + + +XXX + + Oft do I marvel whether Delia's eyes + Are eyes, or else two radiant stars that shine; + For how could nature ever thus devise + Of earth, on earth, a substance so divine? + Stars, sure, they are, whose motions rule desires, + And calm and tempest follow their aspects; + Their sweet appearing still such power inspires, + That makes the world admire so strange effects. + Yet whether fixed or wandering stars are they, + Whose influence rules the orb of my poor heart; + Fixed, sure, they are, but wandering make me stray + In endless errors whence I cannot part. + Stars, then, not eyes, move you with milder view + Your sweet aspect on him that honours you! + + +XXXI + + The star of my mishap imposed this pain + To spend the April of my years in grief; + Finding my fortune ever in the wane, + With still fresh cares, supplied with no relief. + Yet thee I blame not, though for thee 'tis done; + But these weak wings presuming to aspire, + Which now are melted by thine eyes' bright sun + That makes me fall from off my high desire; + And in my fall I cry for help with speed, + No pitying eye looks back upon my fears; + No succour find I now when most I need: + My heats must drown in th'ocean of my tears, + Which still must bear the title of my wrong, + Caused by those cruel beams that were so strong. + + +XXXII + + And yet I cannot reprehend the flight, + Or blame th'attempt, presuming so to soar; + The mounting venture for a high delight + Did make the honour of the fall the more. + For who gets wealth, that puts not from the shore? + Danger hath honours, great designs their fame, + Glory doth follow, courage goes before; + And though th'event oft answers not the same, + Suffice that high attempts have never shame. + The mean observer whom base safety keeps, + Lives without honour, dies without a name, + And in eternal darkness ever sleeps. + And therefore, Delia, 'tis to me no blot + To have attempted though attained thee not. + + +XXXIII + + Raising my hopes on hills of high desire, + Thinking to scale the heaven of her heart, + My slender means presumed too high a part, + Her thunder of disdain forced me retire, + And threw me down to pain in all this fire, + Where lo, I languish in so heavy smart + Because th'attempt was far above my art; + Her pride brooked not poor souls should come so nigh her. + Yet, I protest, my high desiring will + Was not to dispossess her of her right; + Her sovereignty should have remainèd still; + I only sought the bliss to have her sight. + Her sight, contented thus to see me spill, + Framed my desires fit for her eyes to kill. + + +XXXIV + + Why dost thou, Delia, credit so thy glass, + Gazing thy beauty deigned thee by the skies, + And dost not rather look on him, alas! + Whose state best shows the force of murdering eyes? + The broken tops of lofty trees declare + The fury of a mercy-wanting storm; + And of what force thy wounding graces are + Upon myself, you best may find the form. + Then leave thy glass, and gaze thyself on me; + That mirror shows what power is in thy face; + To view your form too much may danger be, + Narcissus changed t'a flower in such a case. + And you are changed, but not t'a hyacinth; + I fear your eye hath turned your heart to flint. + + +XXXV + + I once may see when years shall wreck my wrong, + And golden hairs shall change to silver wire, + And those bright rays that kindle all this fire, + Shall fail in force, their working not so strong, + Then beauty, now the burden of my song, + Whose glorious blaze the world doth so admire, + Must yield up all to tyrant Time's desire; + Then fade those flowers that decked her pride so long. + When if she grieve to gaze her in her glass, + Which then presents her whiter-withered hue, + Go you, my verse, go tell her what she was, + For what she was, she best shall find in you. + Your fiery heat lets not her glory pass, + But phoenix-like shall make her live anew. + + +XXXVI + + Look, Delia, how w'esteem the half-blown rose, + The image of thy blush, and summer's honour, + Whilst yet her tender bud doth undisclose + That full of beauty time bestows upon her. + No sooner spreads her glory in the air, + But straight her wide-blown pomp comes to decline; + She then is scorned that late adorned the fair; + So fade the roses of those cheeks of thine. + No April can revive thy withered flowers, + Whose springing grace adorns thy glory now; + Swift speedy time, feathered with flying hours, + Dissolves the beauty of the fairest brow. + Then do not thou such treasure waste in vain, + But love now whilst thou mayst be loved again. + + +XXXVII + + But love whilst that thou mayst be loved again, + Now whilst thy May hath filled thy lap with flowers, + Now whilst thy beauty bears without a stain, + Now use thy summer smiles, ere winter lowers. + And whilst thou spread'st unto the rising sun, + The fairest flower that ever saw the light, + Now joy thy time before thy sweet be done; + And, Delia, think thy morning must have night, + And that thy brightness sets at length to west, + When thou wilt close up that which now thou showest, + And think the same becomes thy fading best, + Which then shall most inveil and shadow most. + Men do not weigh the stalk for that it was, + When once they find her flower, her glory pass. + + +XXXVIII + + When men shall find thy flower, thy glory pass, + And thou with careful brow sitting alone + Receivèd hast this message from thy glass + That tells the truth, and says that all is gone; + Fresh shalt thou see in me the wounds thou mad'st, + Though spent thy flame, in me the heat remaining. + I that have loved thee thus before thou fad'st, + My faith shall wax when thou art in thy waning. + The world shall find this miracle in me, + That fire can burn when all the matter's spent; + Then what my faith hath been thyself shalt see, + And that thou wast unkind thou mayst repent. + Thou mayst repent that thou hast scorned my tears, + When winter snows upon thy sable hairs. + + +XXXIX + + When winter snows upon thy sable hairs, + And frost of age hath nipped thy beauties near, + When dark shall seem thy day that never clears, + And all lies withered that was held so dear; + Then take this picture which I here present thee, + Limned with a pencil not all unworthy; + Here see the gifts that God and nature lent thee, + Here read thyself and what I suffered for thee. + This may remain thy lasting monument, + Which happily posterity may cherish; + These colours with thy fading are not spent, + These may remain when thou and I shall perish. + If they remain, then thou shalt live thereby; + They will remain, and so thou canst not die. + + +XL + + Thou canst not die whilst any zeal abound + In feeling hearts than can conceive these lines; + Though thou a Laura hast no Petrarch found, + In base attire yet clearly beauty shines. + And I though born within a colder clime, + Do feel mine inward heat as great--I know it; + He never had more faith, although more rhyme; + I love as well though he could better show it. + But I may add one feather to thy fame, + To help her flight throughout the fairest isle; + And if my pen could more enlarge thy name, + Then shouldst thou live in an immortal style. + For though that Laura better limnèd be, + Suffice, thou shalt be loved as well as she! + + +XLI + + Be not displeased that these my papers should + Bewray unto the world how fair thou art; + Or that my wits have showed the best they could + The chastest flame that ever warmèd heart. + Think not, sweet Delia, this shall be thy shame, + My muse should sound thy praise with mournful warble. + How many live, the glory of whose name + Shall rest in ice, while thine is graved in marble! + Thou mayst in after ages live esteemed, + Unburied in these lines, reserved in pureness; + These shall entomb those eyes, that have redeemed + Me from the vulgar, thee from all obscureness. + Although my careful accents never moved thee, + Yet count it no disgrace that I loved thee. + + +XLII + + Delia, these eyes that so admireth thine, + Have seen those walls which proud ambition reared + To check the world, how they entombed have lain + Within themselves, and on them ploughs have eared; + Yet never found that barbarous hand attained + The spoil of fame deserved by virtuous men, + Whose glorious actions luckily had gained + Th'eternal annals of a happy pen. + And therefore grieve not if thy beauties die + Though time do spoil thee of the fairest veil + That ever yet covered mortality, + And must instar the needle and the rail. + That grace which doth more than inwoman thee, + Lives in my lines and must eternal be. + + +XLIII + + Most fair and lovely maid, look from the shore, + See thy Leander striving in these waves, + Poor soul quite spent, whose force can do no more. + Now send forth hope, for now calm pity saves, + And waft him to thee with those lovely eyes, + A happy convoy to a holy land. + Now show thy power, and where thy virtue lies; + To save thine own, stretch out the fairest hand. + Stretch out the fairest hand, a pledge of peace, + That hand that darts so right and never misses; + I shall forget old wrongs, my griefs shall cease; + And that which gave me wounds, I'll give it kisses. + Once let the ocean of my care find shore, + That thou be pleased, and I may sigh no more. + + +XLIV + + Read in my face a volume of despairs, + The wailing Iliads of my tragic woe; + Drawn with my blood, and painted with my cares, + Wrought by her hand that I have honoured so. + Who whilst I burn, she sings at my soul's wrack, + Looking aloft from turret of her pride; + There my soul's tyrant joys her in the sack + Of her own seat, whereof I made her guide. + There do these smokes that from affliction rise, + Serve as an incense to a cruel dame; + A sacrifice thrice-grateful to her eyes, + Because their power serves to exact the same. + Thus ruins she to satisfy her will, + The temple where her name was honoured still. + + +XLV + + My Delia hath the waters of mine eyes, + The ready handmaids on her grace t'attend, + That never fail to ebb, but ever rise; + For to their flow she never grants an end. + The ocean never did attend more duly + Upon his sovereign's course, the night's pale queen, + Nor paid the impost of his waves more truly, + Than mine unto her cruelty hath been. + Yet nought the rock of that hard heart can move, + Where beat these tears with zeal, and fury drives; + And yet, I'd rather languish in her love, + Than I would joy the fairest she that lives. + And if I find such pleasure to complain, + What should I do then if I should obtain? + + +XLVI + + How long shall I in mine affliction mourn, + A burden to myself, distressed in mind; + When shall my interdicted hopes return + From out despair wherein they live confined? + When shall her troubled brow charged with disdain + Reveal the treasure which her smiles impart? + When shall my faith the happiness attain, + To break the ice that hath congealed her heart? + Unto herself, herself my love doth summon, + (If love in her hath any power to move) + And let her tell me, as she is a woman, + Whether my faith hath not deserved her love? + I know her heart cannot but judge with me, + Although her eyes my adversaries be. + + +XLVII + + Beauty, sweet love, is like the morning dew, + Whose short refresh upon the tender green + Cheers for a time but till the sun doth show, + And straight 'tis gone as it had never been. + Soon doth it fade that makes the fairest flourish, + Short is the glory of the blushing rose, + The hue which thou so carefully dost nourish, + Yet which at length thou must be forced to lose. + When thou, surcharged with burden of thy years, + Shalt bend thy wrinkles homeward to the earth, + And that in beauty's lease expired appears + The date of age, the kalends of our death,-- + But ah! no more, this must not be foretold, + For women grieve to think they must be old. + + +XLVIII + + I must not grieve my love, whose eyes would read + Lines of delight, whereon her youth might smile; + Flowers have a time before they come to seed, + And she is young, and now must sport the while. + Ah sport, sweet maid, in season of these years, + And learn to gather flowers before they wither. + And where the sweetest blossoms first appears, + Let love and youth conduct thy pleasures thither. + Lighten forth smiles to clear the clouded air, + And calm the tempest which my sighs do raise; + Pity and smiles do best become the fair, + Pity and smiles shall yield thee lasting praise. + Make me to say, when all my griefs are gone, + Happy the heart that sighed for such a one! + + +XLIX + +_At the Author's going into Italy_ + + Ah whither, poor forsaken, wilt thou go, + To go from sorrow and thine own distress, + When every place presents like face of woe, + And no remove can make thy sorrows less! + Yet go, forsaken! Leave these woods, these plains, + Leave her and all, and all for her that leaves + Thee and thy love forlorn, and both disdains, + And of both wrongful deems and ill conceives. + Seek out some place, and see if any place + Can give the least release unto thy grief; + Convey thee from the thought of thy disgrace, + Steal from thyself and be thy cares' own thief. + But yet what comforts shall I hereby gain? + Bearing the wound, I needs must feel the pain. + + +L + +_This Sonnet was made at the Author's being in Italy_ + + Drawn with th'attractive virtue of her eyes, + My touched heart turns it to that happy coast, + My joyful north, where all my fortune lies, + The level of my hopes desirèd most; + There where my Delia, fairer than the sun, + Decked with her youth whereon the world doth smile, + Joys in that honour which her eyes have won, + Th'eternal wonder of our happy isle. + Flourish, fair Albion, glory of the north! + Neptune's best darling, held between his arms; + Divided from the world as better worth, + Kept for himself, defended from all harms! + Still let disarmèd peace deck her and thee; + And Muse-foe Mars abroad far fostered be! + + +LI + + Care-charmer sleep, son of the sable night, + Brother to death, in silent darkness born, + Relieve my languish, and restore the light; + With dark forgetting of my care return, + And let the day be time enough to mourn + The shipwreck of my ill-adventured youth; + Let waking eyes suffice to wail their scorn, + Without the torment of the night's untruth. + Cease, dreams, the images of day-desires, + To model forth the passions of the morrow; + Never let rising sun approve you liars, + To add more grief to aggravate my sorrow; + Still let me sleep, embracing clouds in vain, + And never wake to feel the day's disdain. + + +LII + + Let others sing of knights and paladins, + In agèd accents and untimely words, + Paint shadows in imaginary lines + Which well the reach of their high wits records; + But I must sing of thee and those fair eyes + Authentic shall my verse in time to come, + When yet th'unborn shall say, Lo, where she lies, + Whose beauty made him speak that else was dumb! + These are the arks, the trophies I erect, + That fortify thy name against old age; + And these thy sacred virtues must protect + Against the dark and time's consuming rage. + Though th'error of my youth in them appear, + Suffice, they show I lived and loved thee, dear. + + +LIII + + As to the Roman that would free his land, + His error was his honour and renown; + And more the fame of his mistaking hand + Than if he had the tyrant overthrown. + So Delia, hath mine error made me known, + And my deceived attempt deserved more fame, + Than if had the victory mine own, + And thy hard heart had yielded up the same. + And so likewise renowned is thy blame; + Thy cruelty, thy glory; O strange case, + That errors should be graced that merit shame, + And sin of frowns bring honour to the face. + Yet happy Delia that thou wast unkind, + Though happier far, if thou would'st change thy mind. + + +LIV + + Like as the lute delights or else dislikes + As is his art that plays upon the same, + So sounds my Muse according as she strikes + On my heart-strings high tuned unto her fame. + Her touch doth cause the warble of the sound, + Which here I yield in lamentable wise, + A wailing descant on the sweetest ground, + Whose due reports give honour to her eyes; + Else harsh my style, untunable my Muse; + Hoarse sounds the voice that praiseth not her name; + If any pleasing relish here I use, + Then judge the world her beauty gives the same. + For no ground else could make the music such, + Nor other hand could give so sweet a touch. + + +LV + + None other fame mine unambitious Muse + Affected ever but t'eternise thee; + All other honours do my hopes refuse, + Which meaner prized and momentary be. + For God forbid I should my papers blot + With mercenary lines with servile pen, + Praising virtues in them that have them not, + Basely attending on the hopes of men. + No, no, my verse respects not Thames, nor theatres; + Nor seeks it to be known unto the great; + But Avon, poor in fame, and poor in waters, + Shall have my song, where Delia hath her seat. + Avon shall be my Thames, and she my song; + No other prouder brooks shall hear my wrong. + + +LVI + + Unhappy pen, and ill-accepted lines + That intimate in vain my chaste desire, + My chaste desire, which from dark sorrow shines, + Enkindled by her eyes' celestial fire; + Celestial fire, and unrespecting powers + Which pity not the wounds made by their might, + Showed in these lines, the work of careful hours, + The sacrifice here offered to her sight. + But since she weighs them not, this rests for me: + I'll moan myself, and hide the wrong I have, + And so content me that her frowns should be + To m'infant style the cradle and the grave. + What though my Muse no honour get thereby; + Each bird sings to herself, and so will I. + + +LVII + + Lo here the impost of a faith entire, + That love doth pay, and her disdain extorts; + Behold the message of a chaste desire + That tells the world how much my grief imports. + These tributary passions, beauty's due, + I send those eyes, the cabinets of love; + That cruelty herself might grieve to view + Th'affliction her unkind disdain doth move. + And how I live, cast down from off all mirth, + Pensive, alone, only but with despair; + My joys abortive perish in their birth, + My griefs long-lived and care succeeding care. + This is my state, and Delia's heart is such; + I say no more, I fear I said too much. + + +REJECTED SONNETS + +[The following four sonnets were Numbers 3, 10, 12 and 16 in Newman's +edition of 1591. They do not appear in any other editions.] + +I + + The only bird alone that nature frames, + When weary of the tedious life she lives, + By fire dies, yet finds new life in flames, + Her ashes to her shape new essence gives. + When only I, the only wretched wight, + Weary of life that breathes but sorrow's blast, + Pursue the flame of such a beauty bright, + That burns my heart, and yet my life still lasts. + O sovereign light, that with thy sacred flame + Consumes my life, revive me after this! + And make me, with the happy bird, the same + That dies to live, by favour of thy bliss! + This deed of thine will show a goddess' power, + In so long death to grant one living hour. + + +II + + The sly enchanter when to work his will + And secret wrong on some forespoken wight, + Frames wax in form to represent aright + The poor unwitting wretch he means to kill, + And pricks the image framed by magic's skill, + Whereby to vex the party day and night; + Like hath she done, whose show bewitched my sight + To beauty's charms, her lover's blood to spill. + For first, like wax she framed me by her eyes, + Whose rays sharp-pointed set upon my breast + Martyr my life and plague me in this wise + With ling'ring pain to perish in unrest. + Nought could, save this, my sweetest fair suffice, + To try her art on him that loves her best. + + +III + + The tablet of my heavy fortunes here + Upon thine altar, Paphian Power, I place. + The grievous shipwreck of my travels dear + In bulgèd bark, all perished in disgrace. + That traitor Love was pilot to my woe; + My sails were hope, spread with my sighs of grief; + The twin lights which my hapless course did show + Hard by th'inconstant sands of false relief, + Were two bright stars which led my view apart. + A siren's voice allured me come so near + To perish on the marble of her heart, + A danger which my soul did never fear. + Lo, thus he fares that trusts a calm too much; + And thus fare I whose credit hath been such! + + +IV + + Weigh but the cause, and give me leave to plain me, + For all my hurt, that my heart's queen hath wrought it; + She whom I love so dear, the more to pain me, + Withholds my right where I have dearly bought it. + Dearly I bought that was so slightly rated, + Even with the price of blood and body's wasting; + She would not yield that ought might be abated, + For all she saw my love was pure and lasting, + And yet now scorns performance of the passion, + And with her presence justice overruleth. + She tells me flat her beauty bears no action; + And so my plea and process she excludeth. + What wrong she doth, the world may well perceive it, + To accept my faith at first, and then to leave it. + + +[This sonnet was Number 8 in Newman's edition of 1591, is found in the +editions of '92 and '94, but was omitted thereafter.] + +V + + Oft and in vain my rebel thoughts have ventured + To stop the passage of my vanquished heart; + And shut those ways my friendly foe first entered, + Hoping thereby to free my better part. + And whilst I guard the windows of this fort, + Where my heart's thief to vex me made her choice, + And thither all my forces do transport, + Another passage opens at her voice. + Her voice betrays me to her hand and eye, + My freedom's tyrant, conquering all by art; + But ah! what glory can she get thereby, + With three such powers to plague one silly heart! + Yet my soul's sovereign, since I must resign, + Reign in my thoughts, my love and life are thine! + + +[The following two sonnets appear for the first time in the second +edition of 1592, where they are marked 31 and 30, the 30 being evidently +a misprint for 32. They are not found in later editions.] + +VI + + Like as the spotless ermelin distressed + Circumpassed round with filth and lothsome mud, + Pines in her grief, imprisoned to her nest, + And cannot issue forth to seek her good; + So I invironed with a hatefull want, + Look to the heavens; the heavens yield forth no grace; + I search the earth, the earth I find as scant, + I view myself, myself in wofull case. + Heaven nor earth will not, myself cannot make + A way through want to free my soul from care; + But I must pine, and in my pining lurk + Lest my sad looks bewray me how I fare. + My fortune mantled with a cloud s'obscure, + Thus shades my life so long as wants endure. + + +VII + + My cares draw on mine everlasting night, + In horror's sable clouds sets my life's sun; + My life's sweet sun, my dearest comfort's light + Shall rise no more to me whose day is done. + I'll go before unto the myrtle shades, + T'attend the presence of my world's dear; + And there prepare her flowers that never fades, + And all things fit against her coming there. + If any ask me why so soon I came, + I'll hide her sin and say it was my lot. + In life and death I'll tender her good name; + My life nor death shall never be her blot. + Although this world may seem her deed to blame, + The Elysian ghosts shall never know the same. + + + + +DIANA + +BY + +HENRY CONSTABLE + + + + +HENRY CONSTABLE + + +The sonnet-cycle in the hands of Henry Constable seems to have been in +the first place rather a record of a succession of "moment's monuments" +than a single dramatic scheme, even an embryonic one. The quaint preface +found in the Harleian transcript of the _Diana_ shows this, and at the +same time tells what freedom was at that period allowed in the structure +and dove-tailing of a sonnet-cycle. It is as follows: + + "The Sonnets following are divided into 3 parts, each parte + contayning 3 several arguments and every argument 7 sonets. + + "The first parte is of variable affections of love: wherein the + first 7 be of the beginning and byrth of his love; the second 7, of + the prayse of his mistresse; the thyrd 7, of severall accidents + hapning in the tyme of his love. + + "The second is the prayse of perticulars: wherein the first 7 be of + the generall honoure of this ile, through the prayses of the heads + thereof, the Q. of England and K. of Scots; the second 7 celebrate + the memory of perticular ladies whoe the author most honoureth: the + thyrd 7 be to the honoure of perticulars, presented upon severall + occasions. + + "The thyrd parte is tragicall, conteyning only lamentations: + wherein the first 7 be complaynts onlye of misfortunes in love, the + second 7, funerall sonets of the death of perticulars; the last 7, + of the end and death of his love." + +The four sonnets to that distinguished "perticular," the King of +Scotland, seem to have won for the author a great deal of fame, for +Bolton mentions one of them as a witness to his opinion that "noble +Henry Constable was a great master in English tongue, nor had any +gentleman of our nation a more pure, quick, or higher delivery of +conceit." The King himself the poet is said to have met personally when +on his propagandist tours in Scotland; for Constable was an ardent Roman +Catholic, and spent most of his life in plots for the re-establishment +of that faith in England. Among the other "perticulars" addressed, the +Queen is of course bounteously favoured, and a number of ladies of her +Court are honoured; the series therefore lacks all pretense of unity. In +fact, the title of the 1594 edition declares that the "excellent +conceitful sonnets of Henry Constable" are "augmented with divers +quartorzains of honourable and learned personages;" and Sidney has been +found to be one of the "honourable and learned personages" whose works +were laid under contribution to make the book; but since the whole first +and second decades are the same as in the earlier volume by "H.C." which +contained also the King James sonnets attributed by numerous +contemporaries to Henry Constable, and since as yet, beside the ten by +Sidney, no more of the sonnets have by antiquarian research been traced +to their sources in the mazes of Elizabethan common-place books, it +seems but fair to leave the _Diana_ of 1594 in the hands of Constable. +All three books, the '92 and '94 editions and the manuscript volume, +show a like taste for orderly arrangement not found in general in the +sonnet-cycles. + +Constable was a Cambridge man and was thirty years old when the _Diana_ +was first printed. He lived until 1613 and bore an excellent reputation +in his day. He was the friend of Ben Jonson, who speaks of his +"ambrosaic Muse," of Sidney, Harington, Tofte, and other literary men. +If toying with the sonnet in _Diana_ seems to indicate a light and +trifling spirit, we have to yield that with Constable as with Fletcher +the graver matters of state policy formed the chief interest in life to +the author. In Constable's case the interest was religious and the poet +was personally a man of devout feeling. Writing from the Tower, where +for a time he was detained, he says, "Whether I remain in prison or go +out, I have learned to live alone with God." At the conclusion of the +third part of the Harleian Miscellany transcript, the author says: "When +I had ended this last sonnet, and found that such vain poems as I had by +idle hours writ, did amount just to the diametrical number 63, +methought it was high time for my folly to die, and to employ the +remnant of my wit to other calmer thoughts less sweet and less bitter." +It was probably in a mood like this that the poet turned from his +devotion to an earthly love and began to write his "Sonnets in honor of +God and his Saints." In this group, as in the other, he expresses that +passion for beauty characteristic of the renaissance, but here he shows +the lack of a clear conception as to where the line should be drawn +between earthly and heavenly beauty. In Constable we see the new +revelation barely emerging from the darkness, the human hand reaching +out in art toward the divine, but not knowing how to take and hold the +higher in its grasp. These sonnets are as "conceitful" as the others, +but the collection illustrates an early effort to turn the poetic energy +into a new field, to broaden the scope of subject-matter possible in +sonnet-form. The poet was evidently a close student of the +sonnet-structure. He used the Italian and the English form in about an +equal number of cases but he experiments on a large variety of +rime-arrangements besides. + +As to the personality honoured under the name of Diana, there seems to +be much obscurity. From the sonnet _To his Mistress_, we learn that +though he addresses several he loves but one. + + "Grace full of grace, though in these verses here + My love complains of others than of thee, + Yet thee alone I loved, and they by me, + Thou yet unknown, only mistaken were." + +So he loved her, it seems, while she was "yet unknown," something quite +possible in the sonneteer's world: and her personality, though shadowed +under various names, is to the poet a distinct conception. To the honour +of being this poet's inspirer, there are two claimants; one the Lady +Rich, the Stella of Sidney, the other the ill-fated Arabella Stuart. It +is noteworthy that the only one of all the sonnets addressed personally +to particular ladies that is retained in the edition of 1594, is one to +Lady Rich. But this sonnet tells us little except that "wishèd fortune" +had once made it possible for him to see her in all her beauty of roses +and lilies, stars and waves of gold: but this might have happened if he +had once seen that beauteous lady pass along the street in the queen's +glittering train. Other sonnets to or about the Lady Rich are equally +uncommunicative; and if the ill-starred Penelope Devereux is the one +alone that Constable loved, Time has shut the secret tightly in his +heart and will not give it up. + +The other guess is but little nearer to certainty. During the years that +Constable was pursuing his shadowy schemes, Arabella Stuart was an +object of admiration and of political jealousy; the house where she +lived was constantly spied upon, her very tutors were suspected, the +wildest schemes were formed upon her royal connections, and it would not +be strange if the heart of our poetical zealot turned toward this star +of his cause. We may be sure that he would not have been averse to a +clandestine meeting, for in writing to that arch-plotter, the Countess +of Shrewsbury, Arabella's doting grandmother, he says: "It is more +convenient to write unto your Ladyship, than to come unto you or to make +any other visits either by day or night till I have further liberty +granted me;" besides this, the Earl of Shrewsbury was distantly related +to Constable's family, and this fact of kinship may have opened the +way; while his sonnet to the Countess intimates that his heart had been +touched by some beauty in her Venus' camp. If not Arabella, who could +this be? + + "To you then, you, the fairest of the wise, + And wisest of the fair I do appeal. + A warrior of your camp by force of eyes + Me prisoner took, and will with rigour deal, + Except you pity in your heart will place, + At whose white hands I only seek for grace." + +As before, the sonnets addressed to Arabella give no definite +information. The first is in the usual strain of praise, and closes: + + "My drift was this, + Some earthly shadow of thy worth to show + Whose heavenly self above world's reason is." + +The second is as follows: + + "Only hope of our age, that virtues dead + By your sweet breath should be revived again; + Learning discouraged long by rude disdain + By your white hands is only cherishèd. + Thus others' worth by you is honourèd. + But who shall honour yours? Poor wits, in vain + We seek to pay the debts which you pertain + Till from yourself some wealth be borrowèd. + Lend some your tongues, that every nation may + In his own hear your virtuous praises blaze; + Lend them your wit, your judgment, memory, + Lest they themselves should not know what to say; + And that thou mayst be loved as much as praised, + My heart thou mayst lend them which I gave thee." + +The last of Constable's sonnets in the edition of 1592 is this +dedicatory address: + + "My mistress' worth gave wings unto my muse + And my muse wings did give unto her name, + So, like twin birds, my muse bred with her fame + Together now do learn their wings to use. + And in this book, which here you may peruse, + Abroad they fly, resolved to try the same + Adventure in their flight; and thee, sweet dame, + Both she and I for our protection choose; + I by my vow, and she by farther right + Under your phoenix (wing) presume to fly; + That from all carrion beaks in safety might + By one same wing be shrouded, she and I. + O happy, if I might but flitter there + Where you and she and I should be so near." + +The value of this author's praise, however, is somewhat impaired by the +extravagances in certain sonnets where, for instance, he honours a lady +whose soul, he says, was "endued in her lifetime with infinite +perfections as her divine poems do testify," when she on earth did sing +poet-wise angels in heaven prayed for her company, and when she died, +her "fair and glittering rays increased the light of heaven;" where +again he calls on the Countess of Essex to revenge the death of her +first husband, Sir Philip Sidney, upon the Spanish people by murdering +them _en masse_ with her eyes, and where he calls the Countess of +Shrewsbury "chieftain of Venus's host," and places her crowned in heaven +beside the Virgin Mary. Constable's zealous publisher was not far wrong +when he claimed that in this poet "conceit first claimed his birthright +to enjoy," and since we do not find either in the sonnets to Lady Rich +or in those to Lady Arabella any special tone of sincerity that leads us +to have confidence in our conjecture, we shall be compelled to leave +this puzzle unsolved. + + + + +DIANA + +UNTO HER MAJESTY'S SACRED HONOURABLE MAIDS + + + Eternal Twins! that conquer death and time, + Perpetual advocates in heaven and earth! + Fair, chaste, immaculate, and all divine, + Glorious alone, before the first man's birth; + Your twofold charities, celestial lights, + Bow your sun-rising eyes, planets of joy, + Upon these orphan poems; in whose rights + Conceit first claimed his birthright to enjoy. + If, pitiful, you shun the song of death, + Or fear the stain of love's life-dropping blood, + O know then, you are pure; and purer faith + Shall still keep white the flower, the fruit, and bud. + Love moveth all things. You that love, shall move + All things in him, and he in you shall love. + +RICHARD SMITH.[A] + +[Footnote A: Richard Smith was the publisher of the 1594 edition of the +_Diana_.] + + +TO HIS MISTRESS + + Grace full of grace, though in these verses here + My love complains of others than of thee, + Yet thee alone I loved, and they by me, + Thou yet unknown, only mistaken were. + Like him which feels a heat now here now there, + Blames now this cause now that, until he see + The fire indeed from whence they causèd be; + Which fire I now do know is you, my dear, + Thus diverse loves dispersèd in my verse + In thee alone for ever I unite, + And fully unto thee more to rehearse; + To him I fly for grace that rules above, + That by my grace I may live in delight, + Or by his grace I never more may love. + + +TO HIS ABSENT DIANA + + Severed from sweet content, my live's sole light, + Banished by over-weening wit from my desire, + This poor acceptance only I require: + That though my fault have forced me from thy sight + Yet that thou would'st, my sorrows to requite, + Review these sonnets, pictures of thy praise; + Wherein each woe thy wondrous worth doth raise, + Though first thy worth bereft me of delight. + See them forsaken; for I them forsook, + Forsaken first of thee, next of my sense; + And when thou deign'st on their black tears to look, + Shed not one tear, my tears to recompence; + But joy in this, though fate 'gainst me repine, + My verse still lives to witness thee divine. + + +THE FIRST DECADE + +I + +_Only of the birth and beginning of love_ + + Resolved to love, unworthy to obtain, + I do no favour crave; but, humble wise, + To thee my sighs in verse I sacrifice, + Only some pity and no help to gain. + Hear then, and as my heart shall aye remain + A patient object to thy lightning eyes, + A patient ear bring thou to thund'ring cries; + Fear not the crack, when I the blow sustain. + So as thine eye bred mine ambitious thought, + So shall thine ear make proud my voice for joy. + Lo, dear, what wonders great by thee are wrought, + When I but little favour do enjoy! + The voice is made the ear for to rejoice, + And your ear giveth pleasure to my voice. + + +II + +_An excuse to his mistress for resolving to love so worthy a creature_ + + Blame not my heart for flying up so high, + Sith thou art cause that it this flight begun; + For earthly vapours drawn up by the sun, + Comets become, and night suns in the sky. + Mine humble heart, so with thy heavenly eye + Drawn up aloft, all low desires doth shun; + Raise thou me up, as thou my heart hast done, + So during night in heaven remain may I. + I say again, blame not my high desire, + Sith of us both the cause thereof depends. + In thee doth shine, in me doth burn a fire, + Fire draws up other, and itself ascends. + Thine eye a fire, and so draws up my love; + My love a fire, and so ascends above. + + +III + +_Of the birth of his love_ + + Fly low, dear love, thy sun dost thou not see? + Take heed, do not so near his rays aspire; + Lest, for thy pride, inflamed with wreakful ire, + It burn thy wings, as it hath burnèd me. + Thou haply sayst thy wings immortal be, + And so cannot consumèd be with fire; + And one is hope, the other is desire, + And that the heavens bestowed them both on thee. + A muse's words made thee with hope to fly, + An angel's face desire hath begot, + Thyself engendered by a goddess' eye; + Yet for all this, immortal thou art not. + Of heavenly eye though thou begotten art, + Yet art thou born but of a mortal heart. + + +IV + +_Of his mistress, upon occasion of a friend of his which dissuaded him +from loving_ + + A friend of mine, pitying my hopeless love, + Hoping by killing hope my love to stay, + "Let not," quoth he, "thy hope, thy heart betray; + Impossible it is her heart to move." + But sith resolvèd love cannot remove + As long as thy divine perfections stay, + Thy godhead then he sought to take away. + Dear, seek revenge and him a liar prove; + Gods only do impossibilities. + "Impossible," saith he, "thy grace to gain." + Show then the power of divinities + By granting me thy favour to obtain. + So shall thy foe give to himself the lie; + A goddess thou shall prove, and happy I! + + +V + +_Of the conspiracy of his lady's eyes and his own to engender love_ + + Thine eye the glass where I behold my heart, + Mine eye the window through the which thine eye + May see my heart, and there thyself espy + In bloody colours how thou painted art. + Thine eye the pile is of a murdering dart; + Mine eye the sight thou tak'st thy level by + To hit my heart, and never shoot'st awry. + Mine eye thus helps thine eye to work my smart. + Thine eye a fire is both in heat and light; + Mine eye of tears a river doth become. + O that the water of mine eye had might + To quench the flames that from thine eye doth come, + Or that the fires kindled by thine eye, + The flowing streams of mine eyes could make dry. + + +VI + +_Love's seven deadly sins_ + + Mine eye with all the deadly sins is fraught. + First _proud_, sith it presumed to look so high. + A watchman being made, stood gazing by, + And _idle_, took no heed till I was caught. + And _envious_, bears envy that by thought + Should in his absence be to her so nigh. + To kill my heart, mine eye let in her eye; + And so consent gave to a _murder_ wrought. + And _covetous_, it never would remove + From her fair hair, gold so doth please his sight. + _Unchaste_, a baud between my heart and love. + A _glutton_ eye, with tears drunk every night. + These sins procurèd have a goddess' ire, + Wherefore my heart is damned in love's sweet fire. + + +VII + +_Of the slander envy gives him for so highly praising his mistress_ + + Falsely doth envy of your praises blame + My tongue, my pen, my heart of flattery, + Because I said there was no sun but thee. + It called my tongue the partial trump of fame, + And saith my pen hath flatterèd thy name, + Because my pen did to my tongue agree; + And that my heart must needs a flatterer be, + Which taught both tongue and pen to say the same. + No, no, I flatter not when thee I call + The sun, sith that the sun was never such; + But when the sun thee I compared withal, + Doubtless the sun I flatterèd too much. + Witness mine eyes, I say the truth in this, + They have seen thee and know that so it is. + + +VIII + +_Of the end and death of his love_ + + Much sorrow in itself my love doth move, + More my despair to love a hopeless bliss, + My folly most to love whom sure to miss + O help me, but this last grief to remove; + All pains, if you command, it joy shall prove, + And wisdom to seek joy. Then say but this, + "Because my pleasure in thy torment is, + I do command thee without hope to love!" + So when this thought my sorrow shall augment + That my own folly did procure my pain, + Then shall I say to give myself content, + "Obedience only made me love in vain. + It was your will, and not my want of wit; + I have the pain, bear you the blame of it!" + + +IX + +_Upon occasion of her walking in a garden_ + + My lady's presence makes the roses red, + Because to see her lips they blush with shame. + The lily's leaves for envy pale became, + And her white hands in them this envy bred. + The marigold the leaves abroad doth spread, + Because the sun's and her power is the same. + The violet of purple colour came, + Dyed in the blood she made my heart to shed. + In brief, all flowers from her their virtue take; + From her sweet breath their sweet smells do proceed; + The living heat which her eyebeams doth make + Warmeth the ground and quickeneth the seed. + The rain wherewith she watereth the flowers, + Falls from mine eyes which she dissolves in showers. + + +X + +_To the Lady Rich_ + + Heralds at arms do three perfections quote, + To wit, most fair, most rich, most glittering; + So when those three concur within one thing, + Needs must that thing of honour be a note. + Lately I did behold a rich fair coat, + Which wishèd fortune to mine eyes did bring. + A lordly coat, yet worthy of a king, + In which one might all these perfections note. + A field of lilies, roses proper bare; + Two stars in chief; the crest was waves of gold. + How glittering 'twas, might by the stars appear; + The lilies made it fair for to behold. + And rich it was as by the gold appeareth; + But happy he that in his arms it weareth! + + +THE SECOND DECADE + +I + +_Of the end and death of his love_ + + If true love might true love's reward obtain, + Dumb wonder only might speak of my joy; + But too much worth hath made thee too much coy, + And told me long ago I sighed in vain. + Not then vain hope of undeservèd gain + Hath made me paint in verses mine annoy, + But for thy pleasure, that thou might'st enjoy + Thy beauty's praise, in glasses of my pain. + See then, thyself, though me thou wilt not hear, + By looking on my verse. For pain in verse, + Love doth in pain, beauty in love appear. + So if thou would'st my verses' meaning see, + Expound them thus, when I my love rehearse: + "None loves like he!" that is, "None fair like me!" + + +II + +_How he encouraged himself to proceed in love, and to hope for favour in +the end at love's hands_ + + It may be, love my death doth not pretend, + Although he shoots at me, but thinks it fit + Thus to bewitch thee for thy benefit, + Causing thy will to my wish to condescend. + For witches which some murder do intend, + Do make a picture and do shoot at it; + And in that part where they the picture hit, + The party's self doth languish to his end. + So love, too weak by force thy heart to taint, + Within my heart thy heavenly shape doth paint; + Suffering therein his arrows to abide, + Only to th'end he might by witches' art, + Within my heart pierce through thy picture's side, + And through thy picture's side might wound my heart. + + +III + +_Of the thoughts he nourished by night when she was retired to bed_ + + The sun, his journey ending in the west, + Taketh his lodging up in Thetis' bed; + Though from our eyes his beams be banishèd, + Yet with his light th' antipodes be blest. + Now when the sun-time brings my sun to rest, + Which me too oft of rest hath hinderèd, + And whiter skin with white sheet coverèd, + And softer cheek doth on soft pillow rest, + Then I, O sun of suns! and light of lights! + Wish me with those antipodes to be, + Which see and feel thy beams and heat by nights. + Well, though the night both cold and darksome is, + Yet half the day's delight the night grants me, + I feel my sun's heat, though his light I miss. + + +IV + +_Of his lady's praise_ + + Lady, in beauty and in favour rare, + Of favour, not of due, I favour crave. + Nature to thee beauty and favour gave; + Fair then thou art, and favour thou may'st spare. + Nor when on me bestowed your favours are, + Less favour in your face you shall not have; + If favour then a wounded soul may save, + Of murder's guilt, dear Lady, then beware. + My loss of life a million fold were less + Than the least loss should unto you befall; + Yet grant this gift; which gift when I possess, + Both I have life and you no loss at all. + For by your favour only I do live, + And favour you may well both keep and give. + + +V + +_Of the end and death of his love_ + + My reason absent did mine eyes require + To watch and ward and such foes to descry + As they should ne'er my heart approaching spy; + But traitor eyes my heart's death did conspire, + Corrupted with hope's gifts; let in desire + To burn my heart; and sought no remedy, + Though store of water were in either eye, + Which well employed, might well have quenched the fire. + Reason returnèd; love and fortune made + Judges, to judge mine eyes to punishment. + Fortune, sith they by sight my heart betrayed + From wishèd sight, adjudged them banishment; + Love, sith by fire murdered my heart was found, + Adjudgèd them in tears for to be drowned. + + +VI + +_Of several complaints of misfortune in love only_ + + Wonder it is and pity is't that she + In whom all beauty's treasure we may find, + That may unrich the body and the mind, + Towards the poor should use no charity. + My love has gone a begging unto thee. + And if that beauty had not been more kind + That pity, long ere this he had been pined; + But beauty is content his food to be. + O pity have when such poor orphans beg! + Love, naked boy, hath nothing on his back; + And though he wanteth neither arm nor leg, + Yet maimed he is sith he his sight doth lack. + And yet though blind he beauty can behold, + And yet though naked he feels more heat than cold. + + +VII + +_Of several complaints of misfortune in love only_ + + Pity refusing my poor love to feed, + A beggar starved for want of help he lies; + And at your mouth, the door of beauty, cries, + That thence some alms of sweet grants might proceed. + But as he waiteth for some almès deed, + A cherry tree before the door he spies. + "O dear," quoth he, "two cherries may suffice. + Two only may save life in this my need." + But beggars, can they nought but cherries eat? + Pardon my love, he is a goddess' son, + And never feedeth but on dainty meat, + Else need he not to pine, as he hath done; + For only the sweet fruit of this sweet tree + Can give food to my love and life to me. + + +VIII + +_Of his lady's veil wherewith she covered her_ + + The fowler hides as closely as he may + The net, where caught the silly bird should be, + Lest he the threatening poison should but see, + And so for fear be forced to fly away. + My lady so, the while she doth assay + In curlèd knots fast to entangle me, + Put on her veil, to th' end I should not flee + The golden net wherein I am a prey. + Alas, most sweet! what need is of a net + To catch a bird that is already ta'en? + Sith with your hand alone you may it get, + For it desires to fly into the same. + What needs such art my thoughts then to entrap, + When of themselves they fly into your lap? + + +IX + +_To his lady's hand upon occasion of her glove which in her absence he +kissed_ + + Sweet hand, the sweet but cruel bow thou art, + From whence at me five ivory arrows fly; + So with five wounds at once I wounded lie, + Bearing my breast the print of every dart. + Saint Francis had the like, yet felt no smart, + Where I in living torments never die. + His wounds were in his hands and feet; where I + All these five helpless wounds feel in my heart. + Now, as Saint Francis, if a saint am I, + The bow that shot these shafts a relic is; + I mean the hand, which is the reason why + So many for devotion thee would kiss: + And some thy glove kiss as a thing divine, + This arrows' quiver, and this relic's shrine. + + +X + +_Of his lady's going over early to bed, so depriving him too soon of her +sight_ + + Fair sun, if you would have me praise your light, + When night approacheth wherefore do you fly? + Time is so short, beauties so many be, + As I have need to see them day and night, + That by continual view my verses might + Tell all the beams of your divinity; + Which praise to you and joy should be to me, + You living by my verse, I by your sight; + I by your sight, and not you by my verse, + Need mortal skill immortal praise rehearse? + No, no, though eyes were blind, and verse were dumb, + Your beauty should be seen and your fame known; + For by the wind which from my sighs do come, + Your praises round about the world are blown. + + +THE THIRD DECADE + +I + +_Complaint of his lady's sickness_ + + Uncivil sickness, hast thou no regard, + But dost presume my dearest to molest, + And without leave dar'st enter in that breast + Whereto sweet love approach yet never dared? + Spare thou her health, which my life hath not spared; + Too bitter such revenge of my unrest! + Although with wrongs my thought she hath opprest, + My wrongs seek not revenge, they crave reward + Cease, sickness, cease in her then to remain; + And come and welcome, harbour thou in me + Whom love long since hath taught to suffer in! + So she which hath so oft my pain increased, + O God, that I might so revengèd be, + By my poor pain might have her pain released! + + +[The Sonnets numbered II to VIII in this Decade are by Sidney, and were +printed among the _Certaine Sonets_ in the 1598 edition of the +_Arcadia_.] + + +IX + + Woe to mine eyes, the organs of mine ill; + Hate to my heart, for not concealing joy; + A double curse upon my tongue be still, + Whose babbling lost what else I might enjoy! + When first mine eyes did with thy beauty joy, + They to my heart thy wondrous virtues told; + Who, fearing lest thy beams should him destroy, + Whate'er he knew, did to my tongue unfold. + My tell-tale tongue, in talking over bold, + What they in private council did declare, + To thee, in plain and public terms unrolled; + And so by that made thee more coyer far. + What in thy praise he spoke, that didst thou trust; + And yet my sorrows thou dost hold unjust. + + +X + + Of an Athenian young man have I read, + Who on blind fortune's picture doated so, + That when he could not buy it to his bed, + On it he gazing died for very woe. + My fortune's picture art thou, flinty dame, + That settest golden apples to my sight; + But wilt by no means let me taste the same. + To drown in sight of land is double spite. + Of fortune as thou learn'dst to be unkind, + So learn to be unconstant to disdain. + The wittiest women are to sport inclined. + Honour is pride, and pride is nought but pain. + Let others boast of choosing for the best; + 'Tis substances not names must make us blest. + + +THE FOURTH DECADE + +I + +_Of the end and death of his love_ + + Needs must I leave and yet needs must I love; + In vain my wit doth tell in verse my woe; + Despair in me, disdain in thee, doth show + How by my wit I do my folly prove. + All this my heart from love can never move. + Love is not in my heart. No, Lady, no, + My heart is love itself. Till I forego + My heart I never can my love remove. + How can I then leave love? I do intend + Not to crave grace, but yet to wish it still; + Not to praise thee, but beauty to commend; + And so, by beauty's praise, praise thee I will; + For as my heart is love, love not in me, + So beauty thou, beauty is not in thee. + + +II + +_Of the prowess of his lady_ + + Sweet sovereign, since so many minds remain + Obedient subjects at thy beauty's call, + So many hearts bound in thy hairs as thrall, + So many eyes die with one look's disdain, + Go, seek the honour that doth thee pertain, + That the Fifth Monarchy may thee befall! + Thou hast such means to conquer men withal, + As all the world must yield or else be slain. + To fight, thou need'st no weapons but thine eyes, + Thine hair hath gold enough to pay thy men, + And for their food thy beauty will suffice; + For men and armour, Lady, care have none; + For one will sooner yield unto thee then + When he shall meet thee naked all alone. + + +III + +_Of the discouragement he had to proceed in love, through the multitude +of his lady's perfections and his own lowness_ + + When your perfections to my thoughts appear, + They say among themselves, "O happy we, + Whichever shall so rare an object see!" + But happy heart, if thoughts less happy were! + For their delights have cost my heart full dear, + In whom of love a thousand causes be, + And each cause breeds a thousand loves in me, + And each love more than thousand hearts can bear. + How can my heart so many loves then hold, + Which yet by heaps increase from day to day? + But like a ship that's o'ercharged with gold, + Must either sink or hurl the gold away. + But hurl not love; thou canst not, feeble heart; + In thine own blood, thou therefore drownèd art! + + +IV + + Fools be they that inveigh 'gainst Mahomet, + Who's but a moral of love's monarchy. + But a dull adamant, as straw by jet, + He in an iron chest was drawn on high. + In midst of Mecca's temple roof, some say, + He now hangs without touch or stay at all. + That Mahomet is she to whom I pray; + May ne'er man pray so ineffectual! + Mine eyes, love's strange exhaling adamants, + Un'wares, to my heart's temple's height have wrought + The iron idol that compassion wants, + Who my oft tears and travails sets at nought. + Iron hath been transformed to gold by art; + Her face, limbs, flesh and all, gold; save her heart. + + +V + + Ready to seek out death in my disgrace, + My mistress 'gan to smooth her gathered brows, + Whereby I am reprievèd for a space. + O hope and fear! who half your torments knows? + It is some mercy in a black-mouthed judge + To haste his prisoner's end, if he must die. + Dear, if all other favour you shall grudge, + Do speedy execution with your eye; + With one sole look you leave in me no soul! + Count it a loss to lose a faithful slave. + Would God, that I might hear my last bell toll, + So in your bosom I might dig a grave! + Doubtful delay is worse than any fever, + Or help me soon, or cast me off for ever! + + +VI + +_Of the end and death of his love_ + + Each day, new proofs of new despair I find, + That is, new deaths. No marvel then, though I + Make exile my last help; to th'end mine eye + Should not behold the death to me assigned. + Not that from death absence might save my mind, + But that it might take death more patiently; + Like him, the which by judge condemned to die, + To suffer with more ease, his eyes doth blind. + Your lips in scarlet clad, my judges be, + Pronouncing sentence of eternal "No!" + Despair, the hangman that tormenteth me; + The death I suffer is the life I have. + For only life doth make me die in woe, + And only death I for my pardon crave. + + +VII + + The richest relic Rome did ever view + Was' Cæsar's tomb; on which, with cunning hand, + Jove's triple honours, the three fair Graces, stand, + Telling his virtues in their virtues true. + This Rome admired; but dearest dear, in you + Dwelleth the wonder of the happiest land, + And all the world to Neptune's furthest strand, + For what Rome shaped hath living life in you. + Thy naked beauty, bounteously displayed, + Enricheth monarchies of hearts with love; + Thine eyes to hear complaints are open laid; + Thine eyes' kind looks requite all pains I prove; + That of my death I dare not thee accuse; + But pride in me that baser chance refuse. + + +VIII + + Why thus unjustly, say, my cruel fate, + Dost thou adjudge my luckless eyes and heart, + The one to live exiled from that sweet smart, + Where th' other pines, imprisoned without date? + My luckless eyes must never more debate + Of those bright beams that eased my love apart; + And yet my heart, bound to them with love's dart, + Must there dwell ever to bemoan my state. + O had mine eyes been suffered there to rest, + Often they had my heart's unquiet eased; + Or had my heart with banishment been blest, + Mine eye with beauty never had been pleased! + But since these cross effects hath fortune wrought, + Dwell, heart, with her; eyes, view her in my thought! + + +[The Sonnet numbered IX is by Sidney, and is found in the _Certaine +Sonets_ printed in the 1598 edition of the _Arcadia_.] + + +X + + Hope, like the hyaena, coming to be old, + Alters his shape, is turned into despair. + Pity my hoary hopes, Maid of clear mould! + Think not that frowns can ever make thee fair. + What harm is it to kiss, to laugh, to play? + Beauty's no blossom, if it be not used. + Sweet dalliance keeps the wrinkles long away; + Repentance follows them that have refused. + To bring you to the knowledge of your good, + I seek, I sue. O try and then believe! + Each image can be chaste that's carved of wood. + You show you live, when men you do relieve. + Iron with wearing shines; rust wasteth treasure. + On earth but love there is no other pleasure. + + +THE FIFTH DECADE + +I + + Ay me, poor wretch, my prayer is turned to sin! + I say, "I love!" My mistress says "'Tis lust!" + Thus most we lose where most we seek to win. + Wit will make wicked what is ne'er so just. + And yet I can supplant her false surmise. + Lust is a fire that for an hour or twain + Giveth a scorching blaze and then he dies; + Love a continual furnace doth maintain. + A furnace! Well, this a furnace may be called; + For it burns inward, yields a smothering flame, + Sighs which, like boiled lead's smoking vapour, scald. + I sigh apace at echo of sighs' name. + Long have I served; no short blaze is my love. + Hid joys there are that maids scorn till they prove. + + +II + + I do not now complain of my disgrace, + O cruel fair one! fair with cruel crost; + Nor of the hour, season, time, nor place; + Nor of my foil, for any freedom lost; + Nor of my courage, by misfortune daunted; + Nor of my wit, by overweening struck; + Nor of my sense, by any sound enchanted; + Nor of the force of fiery-pointed hook; + Nor of the steel that sticks within my wound; + Nor of my thoughts, by worser thoughts defaced; + Nor of the life I labour to confound. + But I complain, that being thus disgraced, + Fired, feared, frantic, fettered, shot through, slain, + My death is such as I may not complain. + + +III + + If ever sorrow spoke from soul that loves, + As speaks a spirit in a man possest, + In me her spirit speaks. My soul it moves, + Whose sigh-swoll'n words breed whirlwinds in my breast; + Or like the echo of a passing bell, + Which sounding on the water seems to howl; + So rings my heart a fearful heavy knell, + And keeps all night in consort with the owl. + My cheeks with a thin ice of tears are clad, + Mine eyes like morning stars are bleared and red. + What resteth then but I be raging mad, + To see that she, my cares' chief conduit-head, + When all streams else help quench my burning heart, + Shuts up her springs and will no grace impart. + + +IV + + You secret vales, you solitary fields, + You shores forsaken and you sounding rocks! + If ever groaning heart hath made you yield, + Or words half spoke that sense in prison locks, + Then 'mongst night shadows whisper out my death. + That when myself hath sealed my lips from speaking, + Each tell-tale echo with a weeping breath, + May both record my truth and true love's breaking. + You pretty flowers that smile for summer's sake, + Pull in your heads before my wat'ry eyes + Do turn the meadows to a standing lake, + By whose untimely floods your glory dies! + For lo, mine heart, resolved to moistening air, + Feedeth mine eyes which double tear for tear. + + +V + + His shadow to Narcissus well presented, + How fair he was by such attractive love! + So if thou would'st thyself thy beauty prove, + Vulgar breath-mirrors might have well contented, + And to their prayers eternally consented, + Oaths, vows and sighs, if they believe might move; + But more thou forc'st, making my pen approve + Thy praise to all, least any had dissented. + When this hath wrought, thou which before wert known + But unto some, of all art now required, + And thine eyes' wonders wronged, because not shown + The world, with daily orisons desired. + Thy chaste fair gifts, with learning's breath is blown, + And thus my pen hath made thy sweets admired. + + +VI + + I am no model figure, or sign of care, + But his eternal heart's-consuming essence, + In whom grief's commentaries written are, + Drawing gross passion into pure quintessence, + Not thine eye's fire, but fire of thine eye's disdain, + Fed by neglect of my continual grieving, + Attracts the true life's spirit of my pain, + And gives it thee, which gives me no relieving. + Within thine arms sad elegies I sing; + Unto thine eyes a true heart love-torn lay I: + Thou smell'st from me the savours sorrows bring; + My tears to taste my truth to touch display I. + Lo thus each sense, dear fair one, I importune; + But being care, thou flyest me as ill fortune. + + +VII + + But being care, thou flyest me as ill fortune;-- + Care the consuming canker of the mind! + The discord that disorders sweet hearts' tune! + Th' abortive bastard of a coward mind! + The lightfoot lackey that runs post by death, + Bearing the letters which contain our end! + The busy advocate that sells his breath, + Denouncing worst to him, is most his friend! + O dear, this care no interest holds in me; + But holy care, the guardian of thy fair, + Thine honour's champion, and thy virtue's fee, + The zeal which thee from barbarous times shall bear, + This care am I; this care my life hath taken. + Dear to my soul, then leave me not forsaken! + + +VIII + + Dear to my soul, then, leave, me not forsaken! + Fly not! My heart within thy bosom sleepeth; + Even from myself and sense I have betaken + Me unto thee for whom my spirit weepeth, + And on the shore of that salt teary sea, + Couched in a bed of unseen seeming pleasure, + Where in imaginary thoughts thy fair self lay; + But being waked, robbed of my life's best treasure, + I call the heavens, air, earth, and seas to hear + My love, my truth, and black disdained estate, + Beating the rocks with bellowings of despair, + Which still with plaints my words reverberate, + Sighing, "Alas, what shall become of me?" + Whilst echo cries, "What shall become of me?" + + +IX + + Whilst echo cries, "What shall become of me?" + And desolate, my desolations pity, + Thou in thy beauty's carack sitt'st to see + My tragic downfall, and my funeral ditty. + No timbrel, but my heart thou play'st upon, + Whose strings are stretched unto the highest key; + The diapason, love; love is the unison; + In love my life and labours waste away. + Only regardless to the world thou leav'st me, + Whilst slain hopes, turning from the feast of sorrow, + Unto despair, their king, which ne'er deceives me, + Captives my heart, whose black night hates the morrow, + And he in truth of my distressed cry + Plants me a weeping star within mine eye. + + +X + + Prometheus for stealing living fire + From heaven's king, was judged eternal death; + In self-same flame with unrelenting ire + Bound fast to Caucasus' low foot beneath. + So I, for stealing living beauty's fire + Into my verse that it may always live, + And change his forms to shapes of my desire, + Thou beauty's queen, self sentence like dost give. + Bound to thy feet in chains of life I lie; + For to thine eyes I never dare aspire; + And in thy beauty's brightness do I fry, + As poor Prometheus in the scalding fire; + Which tears maintain as oil the lamp revives; + Only my succour in thy favour lies. + + +THE SIXTH DECADE + +I + + One sun unto my life's day gives true light. + One moon dissolves my stormy night of woes. + One star my fate and happy fortune shows. + One saint I serve, one shrine with vows I dight. + One sun transfix'd hath burnt my heart outright, + One moon opposed my love in darkness throws. + One star hath bid my thoughts my wrongs disclose. + Saints scorn poor swains, shrines do my vows no right. + Yet if my love be found a holy fire, + Pure, unstained, without idolatry, + And she nathless in hate of my desire, + Lives to repose her in my misery, + My sun, my moon, my star, my saint, my shrine, + Mine be the torment but the guilt be thine! + + +II + + To live in hell, and heaven to behold; + To welcome life, and die a living death; + To sweat with heat, and yet be freezing cold; + To grasp at stars, and lie the earth beneath; + To treat a maze that never shall have end; + To burn in sighs, and starve in daily tears; + To climb a hill, and never to descend; + Giants to kill, and quake at childish fears; + To pine for food, and watch th' Hesperian tree; + To thirst for drink, and nectar still to draw; + To live accurs'd whom men hold blest to be, + And weep those wrongs which never creature saw: + If this be love, if love in these be founded, + My heart is love, for these in it are grounded. + + +III + + A carver, having loved too long in vain, + Hewed out the portraiture of Venus' son + In marble rock, upon the which did rain + Small drizzling drops, that from a fount did run: + Imagining the drops would either wear + His fury out, or quench his living flame; + But when he saw it bootless did appear, + He swore the water did augment the same. + So I, that seek in verse to carve thee out, + Hoping thy beauty will my flame allay, + Viewing my verse and poems all throughout, + Find my will rather to my love obey, + That with the carver I my work do blame, + Finding it still th' augmenter of my flame. + + +IV + + Astronomers the heavens do divide + Into eight houses, where the god remains; + All which in thy perfections do abide. + For in thy feet, the queen of silence reigns; + About thy waist Jove's messenger doth dwell, + Inchanting me as I thereat admire; + And on thy dugs the queen of love doth tell + Her godhead's power in scrolls of my desire; + Thy beauty is the world's eternal sun; + Thy favours force a coward's heart to dare, + And in thy hairs Jove and his riches won. + Thy frowns hold Saturn; thine's the fixèd stars. + Pardon me then, divine, to love thee well, + Since thou art heaven, and I in heaven would dwell! + + +V + + Weary of love, my thoughts of love complained, + Till reason told them there was no such power, + And bade me view fair beauty's richest flower, + To see if there a naked boy remained. + Dear, to thine eyes, eyes that my soul hath pained, + Thoughts turned them back in that unhappy hour + To see if love kept there his royal bower, + For if not there, then no place him contained. + There was he not, nor boy, nor golden bow; + Yet as thou turned thy chaste fair eye aside, + A flame of fire did from thine eyelids go, + Which burnt my heart through my sore wounded side; + Then with a sigh, reason made thoughts to cry, + "There is no god of love, save that thine eye!" + + +VI + + Forgive me, dear, for thundering on thy name; + Sure 'tis thyself that shows my love distrest. + For fire exhaled in freezing clouds possessed, + Warring for way, makes all the heavens exclaim. + Thy beauty so, the brightest living flame, + Wrapt in my cloudy heart, by winter prest, + Scorning to dwell within so base a nest, + Thunders in me thy everlasting flame. + O that my heart might still contain that fire! + Or that the fire would always light my heart! + Then should'st thou not disdain my true desire, + Or think I wronged thee to reveal to my smart; + For as the fire through freezing clouds doth break, + So not myself but thou in me would'st speak. + + +VII + + My heart mine eye accuseth of his death, + Saying his wanton sight bred his unrest; + Mine eye affirms my heart's unconstant faith + Hath been his bane, and all his joys repressed. + My heart avows mine eye let in the fire, + Which burns him with an everliving light. + Mine eye replies my greedy heart's desire + Let in those floods, which drown him day and night. + Thus wars my heart which reason doth maintain, + And calls my eye to combat if he dare, + The whilst my soul impatient of disdain, + Wrings from his bondage unto death more near; + Save that my love still holdeth him in hand; + A kingdom thus divided cannot stand! + + +VIII + + Unhappy day, unhappy month and season, + When first proud love, my joys away adjourning, + Pourèd into mine eye to her eye turning + A deadly juice, unto my green thought's reason. + Prisoner I am unto the eye I gaze on; + Eternally my love's flame is in burning; + A mortal shaft still wounds me in my mourning; + Thus prisoned, burnt and slain, the spirit, soul and reason. + What tides me then since these pains which annoy me, + In my despair are evermore increasing? + The more I love, less is my pain's releasing; + That cursèd be the fortune which destroys me, + The hour, the month, the season, and the cause, + When love first made me thrall to lovers' laws. + + +IX + + Love hath I followed all too long, nought gaining; + And sighed I have in vain to sweet what smarteth, + But from his brow a fiery arrow parteth, + Thinking that I should him resist not plaining. + But cowardly my heart submiss remaining, + Yields to receive what shaft thy fair eye darteth. + Well do I see thine eye my bale imparteth, + And that save death no hope I am detaining. + For what is he can alter fortune's sliding? + One in his bed consumes his life away, + Other in wars, another in the sea; + The like effects in me have their abiding; + For heavens avowed my fortune should be such, + That I should die by loving far too much. + + +X + + My God, my God, how much I love my goddess, + Whose virtues rare, unto the heavens arise! + My God, my God, how much I love her eyes + One shining bright, the other full of hardness! + My God, my God, how much I love her wisdom, + Whose works may ravish heaven's richest maker! + Of whose eyes' joys if I might be partaker + Then to my soul a holy rest would come. + My God, how much I love to hear her speak! + Whose hands I kiss and ravished oft rekisseth, + When she stands wotless whom so much she blesseth. + Say then, what mind this honest love would break; + Since her perfections pure, withouten blot, + Makes her beloved of thee, she knoweth not? + + +THE SEVENTH DECADE + +I + + The first created held a joyous bower, + A flowering field, the world's sole wonderment, + High Paradise, from whence a woman's power + Enticed him to fall to endless banishment. + This on the banks of Euphrates did stand, + Till the first Mover, by his wondrous might, + Planted it in thine eyes, thy face, thy hands, + From whence the world receives his fairest light. + Thy cheeks contain choice flowers; thy eyes, two suns; + Thy hands, the fruit that no life blood can stain; + And in thy breath, that heavenly music wons, + Which, when thou speak'st, angels their voices strain. + As from the first thy sex exilèd me, + So to this next let me be called by thee! + + +II + + Fair grace of graces, muse of muses all, + Thou Paradise, thou only heaven I know! + What influence hath bred my hateful woe, + That I from thee and them am forced to fall? + Thou falled from me, from thee I never shall, + Although my fortunes thou hast brought so low; + Yet shall my faith and service with thee go, + For live I do, on heaven and thee to call. + Banish'd all grace, no graces with me dwell; + Compelled to muse, my muses from me fly; + Excluded heaven, what can remain but hell? + Exiled from paradise, in hate I lie, + Cursing my stars; albeit I find it true, + I lost all these when I lost love and you. + + +III + + What viewed I, dear, when I thine eyes beheld? + Love in his glory? No, him Thyrsis saw, + And stood the boy, whilst he his darts did draw, + Whose painted pride to baser swains he telled. + Saw I two suns? That sight is seen but seld. + Yet can their brood that teach the holy law + Gaze on their beams, and dread them not a straw, + Where princely looks are by their eyes repelled. + What saw I then? Doubtless it was Amen, + Armed with strong thunder and a lightning's flame, + Who bridegroom like with power was riding then, + Meaning that none should see him when he came. + Yet did I gaze; and thereby caught the wound + Which burns my heart and keeps my body sound. + + +IV + + When tedious much and over weary long, + Cruel disdain reflecting from her brow, + Hath been the cause that I endured such wrong + And rest thus discontent and weary now. + Yet when posterity in time to come, + Shall find th' uncancelled tenour of her vow, + And her disdain be then confessed of some, + How much unkind and long, I find it now, + O yet even then--though then will be too late + To comfort me; dead, many a day, ere then-- + They shall confess I did not force her heart; + And time shall make it known to other men + That ne'er had her disdain made me despair, + Had she not been so excellently fair. + + +V + + Had she not been so excellently fair, + My muse had never mourned in lines of woe; + But I did too inestimable weigh her, + And that's the cause I now lament me so. + Yet not for her contempt do I complain me: + Complaints may ease the mind, but that is all; + Therefore though she too constantly disdain me, + I can but sigh and grieve, and so I shall. + Yet grieve I not because I must grieve ever; + And yet, alas, waste tears away, in vain; + I am resolvèd truly to persèver, + Though she persisteth in her old disdain. + But that which grieves me most is that I see + Those which most fair, the most unkindest be. + + +VI + + Thus long imposed to everlasting plaining, + Divinely constant to the worthiest fair, + And movèd by eternally disdaining, + Aye to persèver in unkind despair: + Because now silence wearily confined + In tedious dying and a dumb restraint, + Breaks forth in tears from mine unable mind + To ease her passion by a poor complaint; + O do not therefore to thyself suggest + That I can grieve to have immured so long + Upon the matter of mine own unrest; + Such grief is not the tenour of my song, + That 'bide so zealously so bad a wrong. + My grief is this; unless I speak and plain me, + Thou wilt persèver ever to disdain me. + + +VII + + Thou wilt persèver ever to disdain me; + And I shall then die, when thou will repent it. + O do not therefore from complaint restrain me, + And take my life from me, to me that lent it! + For whilst these accents, weepingly exprest + In humble lines of reverentest zeal, + Have issue to complaint from mine unrest, + They but thy beauty's wonder shall reveal; + And though the grieved muse of some other lover, + Whose less devotions knew but woes like mine, + Would rather seek occasion to discover + How little pitiful and how much unkind, + They other not so worthy beauties find. + O, I not so! but seek with humble prayer, + Means how to move th' unmercifullest fair. + + +VIII + + As draws the golden meteor of the day + Exhaled matter from the ground to heaven, + And by his secret nature, there to stay + The thing fast held, and yet of hold bereaven; + So by th' attractive excellence and might, + Born to the power of thy transparent eyes, + Drawn from myself, ravished with thy delight, + Whose dumb conceits divinely sirenise, + Lo, in suspense of fear and hope upholden, + Diversely poised with passions that pain me, + No resolution dares my thoughts embolden, + Since 'tis not I, but thou that dost sustain me. + O if there's none but thou can work my woe, + Wilt thou be still unkind and kill me so? + + +IX + + Wilt thou be still unkind and kill me so, + Whose humbled vows with sorrowful appeal + Do still persist, and did so long ago + Intreat for pity with so pure a zeal? + Suffice the world shall, for the world can say + How much thy power hath power, and what it can; + Never was victor-hand yet moved to slay + The rendered captive, or the yielding man. + Then, O, why should thy woman-thought impose + Death and disdain on him that yields his breath, + To free his soul from discontent and woes, + And humble sacrifice to a certain death? + O since the world knows what the power can do, + What were't for thee to save and love me too? + + +X + + I meet not mine by others' discontent, + For none compares with me in true devotion; + Yet though my tears and sighs to her be spent, + Her cruel heart disdains what they do motion. + Yet though persisting in eternal hate, + To aggravate the cause of my complaining, + Her fury ne'er confineth with a date, + I will not cease to love, for her disdaining. + Such puny thoughts of unresolvèd ground, + Whose inaudacity dares but base conceit, + In me and my love never shall be found. + Those coward thoughts unworthy minds await. + But those that love well have not yet begun; + Persèver ever and have never done! + + +THE EIGHTH DECADE + +I + + Persèver ever and have never done, + You weeping accent of my weary song! + O do not you eternal passions shun, + But be you true and everlasting long! + Say that she doth requite you with disdain; + Yet fortified with hope, endure your fortune; + Though cruel now she will be kind again; + Such haps as those, such loves as yours importune. + Though she protests the faithfullest severity + Inexecrable beauty is inflicting, + Kindness in time will pity your sincerity, + Though now it be your fortune's interdicting. + For some can say, whose loves have known like passion, + "Women are kind by kind, and coy for fashion." + + +II + + Give period to my matter of complaining, + Fair wonder of our time's admiring eye, + And entertain no more thy long disdaining, + Or give me leave at last that I may die. + For who can live, perpetually secluded + From death to life, that loathes her discontent? + Lest by some hope seducively deluded, + Such thoughts aspire to fortunate event; + But I that now have drawn mal-pleasant breath + Under the burden of thy cruel hate, + O, I must long and linger after death, + And yet I dare not give my life her date; + For if I die and thou repent t' have slain me, + 'Twill grieve me more than if thou didst disdain me. + + +III + + 'Twill grieve me more than if thou didst disdain me, + That I should die; and thou, because I die so. + And yet to die, it should not know to pain me, + If cruel beauty were content to bid so. + Death to my life, life to my long despair + Prolonged by her, given to my love and days, + Are means to tell how truly she is fair, + And I can die to testify her praise. + Yet not to die, though fairness me despiseth, + Is cause why in complaint I thus persèver; + Though death me and my love inparadiseth, + By interdicting me from her for ever. + I do not grieve that I am forced to die, + But die to think upon the reason why. + + +IV + + My tears are true. Though others be divine, + And sing of wars and Troy's new rising frame, + Meeting heroic feet in every line, + That tread high measures in the scene of fame, + And I, though disaccustoming my muse, + And sing but low songs in an humble vein, + May one day raise my style as others use, + And turn Elizon to a higher strain. + When re-intombing from oblivious ages + In better stanzas her surviving wonder, + I may opposed against the monster rage + That part desert and excellence asunder; + That she though coy may yet survive to see, + Her beauty's wonder lives again in me. + + +V + +_Conclusion of the whole_ + + Sometimes in verse I praised, sometimes in verse sighed; + No more shall pen with love and beauty mell, + But to my heart alone my heart shall tell + How unseen flames do burn it day and night, + Lest flames give light, light bring my love to sight, + And my love prove my folly to excel. + Wherefore my love burns like the fire of hell, + Wherein is fire and yet there is no light; + For if one never loved like me, then why + Skill-less blames he the thing he doth not know? + And he that so hath loved should favour show, + For he hath been a fool as well as I. + Thus shall henceforth more pain, more folly have; + And folly past, may justly pardon crave. + + +A CALCULATION UPON THE BIRTH OF AN HONOURABLE LADY'S DAUGHTER, BORN IN +THE YEAR 1588 AND ON A FRIDAY + + Fair by inheritance, whom born we see + Both in the wondrous year and on the day + Wherein the fairest planet beareth sway, + The heavens to thee this fortune doth decree! + Thou of a world of hearts in time shall be + A monarch great, and with one beauty's ray + So many hosts of hearts thy face shall slay, + As all the rest for love shall yield to thee, + But even as Alexander when he knew + His father's conquests wept, lest he should leave + No kingdom unto him for to subdue: + So shall thy mother thee of praise bereave; + So many hearts already she hath slain, + As few behind to conquer shall remain. + + +SONNETS FROM THE MANUSCRIPT EDITION, NOT FOUND IN THAT OF 1594 + +I + +_Of the sudden surprising of his heart, and how unawares he was caught_ + + Delight in your bright eyes my death did breed, + As light and glittering weapons babes allure + To play with fire and sword, and so procure + Then to be burnt and hurt ere they take heed, + Thy beauty so hath made me burn and bleed; + Yet shall my ashes and my blood assure + Thy beauty's fame forever to endure; + For thy fame's life from my death doth proceed; + Because my heart to ashes burnèd giveth + Life to thy fame, thou right a phoenix art, + And like a pelican thy beauty liveth + By sucking blood out of my breast and heart. + Lo why with wonder we may thee compare + Unto the pelican and phoenix rare! + + +II + +_An exhortation to the reader to come and see his mistress's beauty_ + + Eyes curious to behold what nature can create, + Come see, come see, and write what wonder you do see, + Causing by true report our next posterity + Curse fortune for that they were born too late! + Come then and come ye all, come soon lest that + The time should be too short and men too few should be; + For all be few to write her least part's history, + Though they should ever write and never write but that. + Millions look on her eyes, millions think on her wit, + Millions speak of her, millions write of her hand. + The whole eye on the lip I do not understand; + Millions too few to praise but some one part of it, + As either of her eye or lip or hand to write, + The light or black, the taste or red, the soft or white. + + +III + +_Of the excellency of his lady's voice_ + + Lady of ladies, the delight alone + For which to heaven earth doth no envy bear; + Seeing and hearing thee, we see and hear + Such voice, such light, as never sung nor shone. + The want of heaven I grant yet we may moan, + Not for the pleasure of the angels there, + As though in face or voice they like thee were, + But that they many be, and thou but one. + The basest notes which from thy voice proceed, + The treble of the angels do exceed, + So that I fear their choir to beautify, + Lest thou to some in heaven shall sing and shine. + Lo, when I hear thee sing, the reason why + Sighs of my breast keep time with notes of thine! + + +IV + +_Of her excellency both in singing and instruments_ + + Not that thy hand is soft, is sweet, is white, + Thy lips sweet roses, breast sweet lily is, + That love esteems these three the chiefest bliss + Which nature ever made for lips' delight; + But when these three to show their heavenly might + Such wonders do, devotion then for this + Commandeth us with humble zeal to kiss + Such things as work miracles in our sight. + A lute of senseless wood, by nature dumb, + Touched by thy hand doth speak divinely well; + And from thy lips and breast sweet tunes do come + To my dead heart, the which new life do give. + Of greater wonders heard we never tell + Than for the dumb to speak, the dead to live. + + +V + +_Of the envy others bear to his lady for the former perfections_ + + When beauty to the world vouchsafes this bliss, + To show the one whose other there is not, + The whitest skins red blushing shame doth blot, + And in the reddest cheeks pale envy is. + The fair and foul come thus alike by this; + For when the sun hath our horizon got, + Venus herself doth shine no more, God wot, + Than the least star that takes the light from his. + The poor in beauty thus content remain + To see their jealous cause revenged in thee, + And their fair foes afflicted with like pain. + Lo, the clear proof of thy divinity; + For unto God is only due this praise + The highest to pluck down, the low to raise! + + +VI + +_To his mistress, upon occasion of a Petrarch he gave her, showing her +the reason why the Italian commenters dissent so much in the exposition +thereof_ + + Miracle of the world! I never will deny + That former poets praise the beauty of their days; + But all those beauties were but figures of thy praise, + And all those poets did of thee but prophesy. + Thy coming to the world hath taught us to descry + What Petrarch's Laura meant, for truth the lip bewrays. + Lo, why th' Italians, yet which never saw thy rays, + To find out Petrarch's sense such forgèd glosses try! + The beauties which he in a veil enclosed beheld + But revelations were within his surest heart + By which in parables thy coming he foretold; + His songs were hymns of thee, which only now before + Thy image should be sung; for thou that goddess art + Which only we without idolatry adore. + + +VII + +_Complaint of misfortune in love only_ + + Now, now I love indeed, and suffer more + In one day now then I did in a year; + Great flames they be which but small sparkles were, + And wounded now, I was but pricked before. + No marvel then, though more than heretofore + I weep and sigh; how can great wounds be there + Where moisture runs not out? and ever, where + The fire is great, of smoke there must be store. + My heart was hitherto but like green wood, + Which must be dried before it will burn bright; + My former love served but my heart to dry; + Now Cupid for his fire doth find it good: + For now it burneth clear, and shall give light + For all the world your beauty to espy. + + +VIII + +_Complaint of his lady's melancholiness_ + + If that one care had our two hearts possessed, + Or you once (felt) what I long sufferèd, + Then should thy heart accuse in my heart's stead + The rigour of itself for mine unrest. + Then should thine arm upon my shoulder rest, + And weight of grief sway down thy troubled head; + Then should thy tears upon my sheet be shed, + And then thy heart should pant upon my breast. + But when that other cares thy heart do seize, + Alas, what succour gain I then by this, + But double grief for thine and mine unease? + Yet when thou see'st thy hurts to wound my heart, + And so art taught by me what pity is, + Perhaps thy heart will learn to feel my smart. + + +IX + + Dear, though from me your gratious looks depart, + And of that comfort do myself bereave, + Which both I did deserve and did receive, + Triumph not over much in this my smart. + Nay, rather they which now enjoy thy heart + For fear just cause of mourning should conceive, + Lest thou inconstant shouldst their trust deceive + Which like unto the weather changing art. + For in foul weather birds sing often will + In hope of fair, and in fair time will cease, + For fear fair time should not continue still; + So they may mourn which have thy heart possessed + For fear of change, and hope of change may ease + Their hearts whom grief of change doth now molest. + + +X + + If ever any justly might complain + Of unrequited service, it is I; + Change is the thanks I have for loyalty, + And only her reward is her disdain; + So as just spite did almost me constrain, + Through torment her due praises to deny, + For he which vexèd is with injury + By speaking ill doth ease his heart of pain. + But what, shall torture make me wrong her name? + No, no, a pris'ner constant thinks it shame, + Though he (were) racked his first truth to gainsay. + Her true given praise my first confession is; + Though her disdain do rack me night and day, + This I confessed, and will deny in this. + + +Printed by BALLANTYNE, HANSON & CO. London & Edinburgh + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Elizabethan Sonnet-Cycles, by +Samuel Daniel and Henry Constable + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ELIZABETHAN SONNET-CYCLES *** + +***** This file should be named 18842-8.txt or 18842-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/8/4/18842/ + +Produced by David Starner, Taavi Kalju and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Elizabethan Sonnet-Cycles + Delia - Diana + +Author: Samuel Daniel and Henry Constable + +Editor: Martha Foote Crow + +Release Date: July 16, 2006 [EBook #18842] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ELIZABETHAN SONNET-CYCLES *** + + + + +Produced by David Starner, Taavi Kalju and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<div class="figcenter"> + <img src="images/01.jpg" + alt="Title page" + title="Title page" /> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h1>ELIZABETHAN SONNET-CYCLES</h1> + +<h3>EDITED BY</h3> + +<h2>MARTHA FOOTE CROW</h2> + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> + +<h1>DELIA</h1> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>SAMUEL DANIEL</h2> + +<hr style="width: 25%;" /> + +<h1>DIANA</h1> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>HENRY CONSTABLE</h2> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p class="center">KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRÜBNER AND CO.<br /> +PATERNOSTER HOUSE LONDON W.C.<br /> +1896</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h1>DELIA</h1> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>SAMUEL DANIEL</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span></p> +<h2>SAMUEL DANIEL</h2> + + +<p>Daniel's sonnet series has been by many regarded as the prototype of +Shakespeare's. It is true that several of Daniel's themes are repeated +in the cycle composed by the greater poet. The ideas of immortality in +verse, the transitoriness of beauty, the assurances of truth, the +humility and the woes of the lover, the pain of separation and the +comfort of night thoughts, shape the mood of both poets. But these +motives are also found in the pages of many other sonneteers of the +time. All these devotees seem to have had a storehouse of poetic +conceits which they held in common, and from which each poet had the +right to draw materials to use in his own way. In fact Shakespeare's +sonnets are full of echoes from the voices of Sidney, Constable, Davies, +Lodge, Watson,<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span> Drayton and Barnes, as well as from that mellifluous one +of Daniel; and these poetic conceits were tossed forth in the first +place by the Italian sonnet makers, led by Petrarch. It is evident that +Daniel's <i>Petrarch</i> has been well-thumbed. Wood says that Daniel left +Oxford without a degree because "his geny" was "more prone to easier and +smoother studies than in pecking and hewing at logic," and we may +believe that Italian was one of these smoother studies. His translation +of Paolo Giovi's work on Emblems, which was published in 1585, was +doubtless one fruit of this study, a work that since it took him into +the very realm of the <i>concetti</i>, was to be a potent influence upon his +mental growth. The main theme, the cruelty of the Fair, is the same as +that of Petrarch. Daniel follows this master in making the vale echo +with his sighs, in appealing to her hand and cruel bosom for mercy, in +recounting the number of years he has worshipped her and honored her +with sonnets on which he is depending for immortal fame, in upbraiding +her for her devotion to the mirror rather than to him, and for ensnaring +him with the golden net of her hair and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> transpiercing him with the +darts from her crystalline eyes. In some of Petrarch's nobler flights +Daniel does not follow; the higher teachings of love are not revealed to +him, the step from human to divine he does not take; yet in the main, +the features of the earlier poet re-appear in Daniel's verse, as they do +in most of his fellow-sonneteers, including Shakespeare.</p> + +<p>It is also not best to give too much weight to the opinion that +Shakespeare has been over-influenced by Daniel in the adoption of the +quatrain and couplet structure. The whole period from Wyatt to +Shakespeare shows a slow and steady mastery of the native over the +foreign tendency. The change was not a sudden leap on the part of Daniel +and Shakespeare, but a gradual growth occupying a half century and +culminating in the English form. But if we should feel convinced that +Shakespeare's memory was influenced by the sound of Daniel's cadences, +this need not be considered discreditable to Shakespeare. Daniel's lines +are smooth and melodious, and he was perhaps as great a master of the +technique of rhyme as was Shake<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span>speare. If we take the sonnets of both +poets as criterion, the careful Daniel uses twice as many rhyme colours +as Shakespeare, while Shakespeare repeats rhymes twice as often as +Daniel. If double rhymes find less favor with the captious, we admit +that Daniel has a third more than Shakespeare has, but again Shakespeare +uses twice as many rhymes on syllables with secondary stress as does +Daniel, and Shakespeare's bad rhymes are as bad as Daniel's and more +frequent.</p> + +<p>Daniel's poetic powers were appreciated to the full in his time. To his +contemporaries he was the "well languaged," the "sharp conceited," one +by whose verse Rosamond was eternised, one who "divinely sonnetted his +Delia." When Judicio in <i>The Return from Parnassus</i> makes his inventory +of poet's qualities, in giving his judgment on Daniel, he evidently has +the <i>Delia</i> in mind.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Sweet honey-dropping Daniel doth wage<br /></span> +<span class="i0">War with the proudest big Italian<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That melts his heart in sugared sonnetting."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>If Jonson, Daniel's rival as maker of masques for<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> the Court, proclaimed +him a good honest man but no poet, Spenser generously said he surpassed +"all that afore him came;" and scarcely one of the more prominent of his +contemporaries failed to address compliments to him. When Daniel was +gentleman extraordinary and groom of the privy chamber to Anne, +Queen-consort to James I., the Queen is said to have been a "favourer +and encourager of his muse;" and his high social position made it easy +for less favoured aspirants to praise him. But the perspective of time +brings a more balanced judgment. While Lowell finds in the fact that +Daniel was held in high esteem by his contemporaries a proof that noble +diction was appreciated then as now, and while he admits that Daniel +refined our tongue, yet he decided that Daniel had the thinking and +languaging parts of a poet's outfit but lacked the higher creative gift. +We shall find Daniel at his best, not when in prosaic soberness he sings</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"... the civil wars, tumultuous broils,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And bloody factions of a mighty land."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>not when he is framing stilted tragedies with<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> chorus and declamation in +the grand Senecan manner, not in his complimentary addresses to lords, +ladies and royalty, nor in the classic masques and philosophical +dialogue, but in the less ambitious poems of <i>Delia</i> and <i>Rosamond</i>, +especially in such a sonnet as "Care-charmer Sleep," where we come more +near to hearing a human heart beat than in any of the others. It is not +a mighty heart, but it is one that is gentle, tender and pure.</p> + +<p>A glance at the life of Daniel gives opportunity for an easy conjecture +as to the personality of the lady honoured under the name of Delia. At +seventeen Daniel was at Oxford, and finished a three years' residence at +Magdalen College in 1582. After a visit to Italy, he became established +at Wilton as tutor to the sons of Mary Sidney, Countess of Pembroke. To +those early days at Wilton the poet refers, when in 1603 he dedicates +his <i>Defense of Rhyme</i> to William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, his former +pupil. In the introduction to this fine essay Daniel declares that in +regard to his poetic studies he was "first encouraged and framed +thereunto by your most<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> worthy and honourable mother, and received the +first notion for the formal ordering of those compositions at Wilton +which I must ever acknowledge as my best school, and thereof always am +to hold a feeling and grateful memory." At this time the home of the +Herberts at Wilton was a literary centre. The Countess was herself an +industrious author, and the subject of innumerable dedicatory addresses. +She seems to have been as beautiful as she was gracious and gifted. In +the Penshurst picture we see her in extreme youth. The long oval and +delicate chiselling of the Sidney face are expressed in their finest +perfection, and justify the resemblance, found by Spenser, to "her +brother dear." The soft hair is of the same golden-brown as his, the +colour her eldest son inherited, and which Shakespeare is said to have +described in his figure of the marjoram-buds. In the picture by +Gheeraedts at the National Portrait Gallery, painted in 1614, she has +lost little of her youthful beauty, but has added the special graces of +maturity. The hair is still a rich brown. A thoughtful soul sits +brooding behind those attentive eyes—a soul that seems to wish to ask +the universal un<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span>answerable questions, one that has grappled with doubt +and struggled with environing circumstance, but has not yet consented to +be baffled. The face is modern and complex. This accomplished lady +received at Wilton the most distinguished people of her time. Her guests +included Spenser, Raleigh, probably Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Inigo +Jones, Sir John Harrington, Dr. Donne, and many more; and the Countess's +<i>Pastoral Dialogue in Praise of Astraea</i> was probably written in honour +of a visit from the Queen herself. It would perhaps be strange if the +young poet did not surround the personality of this fascinating +patroness with a romantic halo and feel that his poetic fame was linked +with hers. The Delia of the sonnets has all the excellencies that a +sonnet-honoured lady should have, including locks of gold. But the fact +that the poet has slyly changed the word "amber" to "snary" in sonnet +xiv., and "golden" to "sable" in sonnet xxxviii., looks as if he desired +to shield her personality from too blunt a guess. However, many hints +are given; she lives in the "joyful North," in "fair Albion;" she is</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"The eternal wonder of our happy Isle."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span>And the river by which he sounds her name is the Avon—</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"But Avon, poor in fame and poor in waters,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall have my song, where Delia hath her seat."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The Wiltshire Avon is the proud brook that flows southward by Wilton, +"where Delia hath her seat." If it may seem in any degree unfitting that +Daniel should address language so glowing as is found in the <i>Delia</i> +sonnets to a lady who is established as the head of a household with +husband and sons about her, attention may be called to the fact that the +sonnets, though they are characterised by warmth of feeling and +extravagance of expression, do not contain one tainted line. Posterity +must justify what Daniel in proud humility said of himself:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"I <b> . . . . . . .</b><br /></span> +<span class="i0"><b>. . .</b> never had my harmless pen at all<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Distained with any loose immodesty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But still have done the fairest offices<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To virtue and the time."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The respectful dignity of Daniel's prose dedication of <i>Delia</i> to Mary +Sidney cannot be surpassed; and<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> the introductory sonnet that displaces +it in the next edition, while confessing the ardent devotion of the +writer, is yet couched in the most reverent terms. Daniel and other +sonneteers had the great example of Petrarch in honouring a lady with +admiration and love expressed in verses whose warmth might perhaps not +have been so excusable, could the poet have been taken at his word. The +new sonnets inserted in the editions of 1601 and 1623 show the +faithfulness of the poet's homage. A loyal friendship, whether formed +upon gratitude only or upon some warmer feeling, inspired the <i>Delia</i> +although the poet expresses his devotion in the conventional modes. But +that Daniel outgrew to some extent the taste for these fanciful devices +is shown by the changes he made in successive editions. Four sonnets +from the 1591 edition were never reprinted, another was reprinted once +and afterwards omitted. In our text the order of the 1623 edition is +followed, the edition that was supervised by the poet's brother; but +these omitted sonnets will be found at the end under the head of +<i>Rejected Sonnets</i>. It is certain that they are Daniel's and that he +re<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span>jected them, and it therefore seems no more than fair to the poet, if +they are reprinted at all, to insert them under this head.</p> + +<p>While, then, these rejected sonnets may have been in two cases omitted +by the poet because of their too great frankness of expression, in other +cases, notably in the phoenix, the wax-image, the tablet-and-siren, the +vanquished fort, and the ermelin sonnets, they seem to have lost their +charm, not so much for any personal reason as for the artistic defect in +the far-fetched nature of the device.</p> + +<p>Daniel lived till 1619, experiencing the usual ups and downs in the +career of a "Court-dear poet." In later years, the famous Lady Anne +Clifford, wife of Mary Sidney's younger son, caused a monument to be +erected in his honour, in the inscription upon which she recorded her +pride in the fact that he had once been her tutor.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span></p> +<h3>TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE</h3> + +<h2>THE LADY MARY</h2> + +<h3>COUNTESS OF PEMBROKE</h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wonder of these, glory of other times,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O thou whom envy ev'n is forced t'admire!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Great Patroness of these my humble rhymes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which thou from out thy greatness dost inspire!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Since only thou has deigned to raise them higher,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Vouchsafe now to accept them as thine own,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Begotten by thy hand and my desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wherein my zeal and thy great might is shown.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And seeing this unto the world is known,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O leave not still to grace thy work in me;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let not the quickening seed be overthrown<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of that which may be born to honor thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whereof the travail I may challenge mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But yet the glory, Madam, must be thine!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span></p> + + +<h3>TO DELIA</h3> + +<h4>I</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Unto the boundless ocean of thy beauty<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Runs this poor river, charged with streams of zeal,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Returning thee the tribute of my duty,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which here my love, my youth, my plaints reveal.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Here I unclasp the book of my charged soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where I have cast th' accounts of all my care;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Here have I summed my sighs. Here I enrol<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How they were spent for thee. Look, what they are.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Look on the dear expenses of my youth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And see how just I reckon with thine eyes.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Examine well thy beauty with my truth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cross my cares ere greater sums arise.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Read it, sweet maid, though it be done but slightly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who can show all his love, doth love but lightly.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Go, wailing verse, the infants of my love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Minerva-like, brought forth without a mother;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Present the image of the cares I prove,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Witness your father's grief exceeds all other.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sigh out a story of her cruel deeds,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With interrupted accents of despair;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A monument that whosoever reads,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May justly praise and blame my loveless Fair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Say her disdain hath drièd up my blood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And starvèd you, in succours still denying;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Press to her eyes, importune me some good,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Waken her sleeping pity with your crying:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Knock at her hard heart, beg till you have moved her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And tell th'unkind how dearly I have loved her.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If so it hap this offspring of my care,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">These fatal anthems, lamentable songs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Come to their view, who like afflicted are;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let them yet sigh their own, and moan my wrongs.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But untouched hearts with unaffected eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Approach not to behold my soul's distress;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Clear-sighted you soon note what is awry,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whilst blinded souls mine errors never guess.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You blinded souls, whom youth and error lead;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">You outcast eaglets dazzled with your sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Do you, and none but you, my sorrows read;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">You best can judge the wrongs that she hath done,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That she hath done, the motive of my pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who whilst I love doth kill me with disdain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">These plaintive verse, the posts of my desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which haste for succour to her slow regard,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bear not report of any slender fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Forging a grief to win a fame's reward.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor are my passions limned for outward hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For that no colours can depaint my sorrows;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Delia herself, and all the world may view<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Best in my face where cares have tilled deep furrows.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No bays I seek to deck my mourning brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O clear-eyed rector of the holy hill!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My humble accents bear the olive bough<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of intercession but to move her will.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">These lines I use t'unburden mine own heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My love affects no fame nor 'steems of art.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>V</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whilst youth and error led my wandering mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And set my thoughts in heedless ways to range,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All unawares a goddess chaste I find,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Diana-like, to work my sudden change.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For her, no sooner had mine eye bewrayed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But with disdain to see me in that place,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With fairest hand the sweet unkindest maid<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Casts water-cold disdain upon my face.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which turned my sport into a hart's despair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which still is chased, while I have any breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By mine own thoughts set on me by my Fair.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My thoughts like hounds pursue me to my death;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those that I fostered of mine own accord,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Are made by her to murder thus their lord.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fair is my love, and cruel as she's fair;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her brow shades frowns although her eyes are sunny;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her smiles are lightning though her pride despair;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And her disdains are gall, her favours honey;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A modest maid, decked with a blush of honour,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose feet do tread green paths of youth and love;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The wonder of all eyes that look upon her,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sacred on earth, designed a saint above.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Chastity and beauty, which were deadly foes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Live reconcilèd friends within her brow;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And had she pity to conjoin with those,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then who had heard the plaints I utter now?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O had she not been fair and thus unkind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My Muse had slept and none had known my mind!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">For had she not been fair and thus unkind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then had no finger pointed at my lightness;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The world had never known what I do find,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And clouds obscure had shaded still her brightness.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then had no censor's eye these lines surveyed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor graver brows have judged my Muse so vain;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No sun my blush and error had bewrayed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor yet the world had heard of such disdain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then had I walked with bold erected face;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No downcast look had signified my miss;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But my degraded hopes with such disgrace<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Did force me groan out griefs and utter this.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For being full, should I not then have spoken,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My sense oppressed had failed and heart had broken.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VIII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou, poor heart, sacrificed unto the fairest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hast sent the incense of thy sighs to heaven;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And still against her frowns fresh vows repairest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And made thy passions with her beauty even.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you, mine eyes, the agents of my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Told the dumb message of my hidden grief;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And oft, with careful tunes, with silent art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Did treat the cruel Fair to yield relief.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you, my verse, the advocates of love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Have followed hard the process of my case:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And urged that title which doth plainly prove<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My faith should win, if justice might have place.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet though I see that nought we do can move,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Tis not disdain must make me cease to love.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IX</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If this be love, to draw a weary breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To paint on floods till the shore cry to th'air;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With downward looks still reading on the earth.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">These sad memorials of my love's despair;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If this be love, to war against my soul,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lie down to wail, rise up to sigh and grieve,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The never-resting stone of care to roll,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still to complain my griefs, whilst none relieve;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If this be love, to clothe me with dark thoughts,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Haunting untrodden paths to wail apart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My pleasures horror, music tragic notes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tears in mine eyes and sorrow at my heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If this be love, to live a living death,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then do I love, and draw this weary breath.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>X</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Then do I love and draw this weary breath<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For her, the cruel Fair, within whose brow<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I written find the sentence of my death<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In unkind letters wrote she cares not how.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou power that rul'st the confines of the night,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Laughter-loving goddess, worldly pleasures' queen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Intenerate that heart that sets so light<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The truest love that ever yet was seen;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And cause her leave to triumph in this wise<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon the prostrate spoil of that poor heart<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That serves, a trophy to her conquering eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And must their glory to the world impart;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Once let her know sh'hath done enough to prove me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let her pity if she cannot love me!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Tears, vows and prayers gain the hardest hearts,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tears, vows and prayers have I spent in vain;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tears cannot soften flint nor vows convert;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Prayers prevail not with a quaint disdain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I lose my tears where I have lost my love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I vow my faith where faith is not regarded,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I pray in vain a merciless to move;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So rare a faith ought better be rewarded.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet though I cannot win her will with tears,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though my soul's idol scorneth all my vows,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though all my prayers be to so deaf ears,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No favour though the cruel Fair allows,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet will I weep, vow, pray to cruel she;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Flint, frost, disdain, wears, melts and yields, we see.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My spotless love hovers with purest wings<br /></span> +<span class="i2">About the temple of the proudest frame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where blaze those lights, fairest of earthly things;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which clear our clouded world with brightest flame.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">M'ambitious thoughts, confinèd in her face,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Affect no honour but what she can give;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My hopes do rest in limits of her grace;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I weigh no comfort unless she relieve.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For she that can my heart imparadise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Holds in her fairest hand what dearest is.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My fortune's wheel's the circle of her eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose rolling grace deign once a turn of bliss.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All my life's sweet consists in her alone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So much I love the most unloving one.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XIII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Behold what hap Pygmalion had to frame<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And carve his proper grief upon a stone!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My heavy fortune is much like the same;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I work on flint and that's the cause I moan.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For hapless lo, even with mine own desires<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I figured on the table of my heart<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The fairest form that the world's eye admires,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And so did perish by my proper art.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And still I toil to change the marble breast<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of her whose sweetest grace I do adore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet cannot find her breathe unto my rest.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hard is her heart, and woe is me therefore.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O happy he that joyed his stone and art!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unhappy I, to love a stony heart!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XIV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Those snary locks are those same nets, my dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wherewith my liberty thou didst surprise<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Love was the flame that firèd me so near,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The dart transpiercing were those crystal eyes.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Strong is the net, and fervent is the flame;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Deep is the wound my sighs can well report.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet I do love, adore, and praise the same,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That holds, that burns, that wounds in this sort;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And list not seek to break, to quench, to heal,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The bond, the flame, the wound that festereth so,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By knife, by liquor, or by salve to deal;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So much I please to perish in my woe.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet lest long travails be above my strength,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Good Delia, loose, quench, heal me, now at length!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If that a loyal heart and faith unfeigned,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If a sweet languish with a chaste desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If hunger-starven thoughts so long retained,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fed but with smoke, and cherished but with fire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if a brow with care's charàcters painted<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bewray my love with broken words half spoken<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To her which sits in my thoughts' temple sainted,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And lays to view my vulture-gnawn heart open;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If I have done due homage to her eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And had my sighs still tending on her name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If on her love my life and honour lies,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And she, th'unkindest maid, still scorns the same;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let this suffice, that all the world may see<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fault is hers, though mine the hurt must be.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XVI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Happy in sleep, waking content to languish,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Embracing clouds by night, in daytime mourn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My joys but shadows, touch of truth my anguish,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Griefs ever springing, comforts never born;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And still expecting when she will relent,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Grown hoarse with crying, "mercy, mercy give,"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So many vows and prayers having spent<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That weary of my life I loathe to live;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And yet the hydra of my cares renews<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still new-born sorrows of her fresh disdain;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And still my hope the summer winds pursues,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Finding no end nor period of my pain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This is my state, my griefs do touch so nearly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thus I live because I love her dearly.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XVII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why should I sing in verse? Why should I frame<br /></span> +<span class="i2">These sad neglected notes for her dear sake?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Why should I offer up unto her name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sweetest sacrifice my youth can make?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why should I strive to make her live for ever,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That never deigns to give me joy to live?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Why should m'afflicted Muse so much endeavour<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Such honour unto cruelty to give?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If her defects have purchased her this fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What should her virtues do, her smiles, her love?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If this her worst, how should her best inflame?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What passions would her milder favours move?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Favours, I think, would sense quite overcome;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that makes happy lovers ever dumb.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XVIII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Since the first look that led me to this error,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To this thoughts' maze to my confusion tending,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Still have I lived in grief, in hope, in terror,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The circle of my sorrows never ending;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet cannot leave her love that holds me hateful;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her eyes exact it, though her heart disdains me.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">See what reward he hath that serves th'ungrateful?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So true and loyal love no favour gains me.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still must I whet my young desires abated,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon the flint of such a heart rebelling;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And all in vain; her pride is so innated,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She yields no place at all for pity's dwelling.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oft have I told her that my soul did love her,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that with tears; yet all this will not move her.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XIX</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Restore thy tresses to the golden ore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yield Cytherea's son those arks of love;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bequeath the heavens the stars that I adore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And to the orient do thy pearls remove;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yield thy hands' pride unto the ivory white;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">T'Arabian odours give thy breathing sweet;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Restore thy blush unto Aurora bright;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To Thetis give the honour of thy feet.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let Venus have the graces she resigned,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thy sweet voice give back unto the spheres;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But yet restore thy fierce and cruel mind<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To Hyrcan tigers and to ruthless bears;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yield to the marble thy hard heart again;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So shalt thou cease to plague, and I to pain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XX</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What it is to breathe and live without life;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How to be pale with anguish, red with fear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">T'have peace abroad, and nought within but strife:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wish to be present, and yet shun t'appear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How to be bold far off, and bashful near;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How to think much, and have no words to speak;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To crave redress, yet hold affliction dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To have affection strong, a body weak,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Never to find, yet evermore to seek;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And seek that which I dare not hope to find;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">T'affect this life and yet this life disleek,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Grateful t'another, to myself unkind:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This cruel knowledge of these contraries,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Delia, my heart hath learned out of those eyes.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If beauty thus be clouded with a frown,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That pity shines no comfort to my bliss,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And vapours of disdain so overgrown,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That my life's light wholly indarkened is,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Why should I more molest the world with cries,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The air with sighs, the earth below with tears,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Since I live hateful to those ruthful eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Vexing with untuned moan her dainty ears!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If I have loved her dearer than my breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My breath that calls the heaven to witness it!—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And still hold her most dear until my death,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And if that all this cannot move one whit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet sure she cannot but must think apart<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She doth me wrong to grieve so true a heart.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Come Time, the anchor hold of my desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My last resort whereto my hopes appeal;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cause once the date of her disdain t'exspire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Make her the sentence of her wrath repeal.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Rob her fair brow, break in on beauty, steal<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Power from those eyes which pity cannot spare;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Deal with those dainty cheeks, as she doth deal<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With this poor heart consumèd with despair.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This heart made now the pròspective of care<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By loving her, the cruelst fair that lives,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The cruelst fair that sees I pine for her,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And never mercy to thy merit gives.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let her not still triumph over the prize<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of mine affections taken by her eyes.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXIII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Time, cruel Time, come and subdue that brow<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which conquers all but thee, and thee too stays,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As if she were exempt from scythe or bow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From love or years unsubject to decays.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or art thou grown in league with those fair eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That they may help thee to consume our days?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or dost thou spare her for her cruelties,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Being merciless like thee that no man weighs?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And yet thou seest thy power she disobeys,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cares not for thee, but lets thee waste in vain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And prodigal of hours and years betrays<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beauty and youth t'opinion and disdain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet spare her, Time; let her exempted be;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She may become more kind to thee or me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXIV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">These sorrowing sighs, the smoke of mine annoy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">These tears, which heat of sacred flame distils,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are those due tributes that my faith doth pay<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unto the tyrant whose unkindness kills.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I sacrifice my youth and blooming years<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At her proud feet, and she respects not it;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My flower, untimely's withered with my tears,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By winter woes for spring of youth unfit.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">She thinks a look may recompense my care,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And so with looks prolongs my long-looked ease;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As short that bliss, so is the comfort rare;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet must that bliss my hungry thoughts appease.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus she returns my hopes so fruitless ever;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Once let her love indeed, or eye me never!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">False hope prolongs my ever certain grief,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Traitor to me, and faithful to my love.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A thousand times it promised me relief,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet never any true effect I prove.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Oft when I find in her no truth at all,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I banish her, and blame her treachery;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet soon again I must her back recall,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As one that dies without her company.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus often, as I chase my hope from me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Straightway she hastes her unto Delia's eyes;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fed with some pleasing look, there shall she be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And so sent back. And thus my fortune lies;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Looks feed my hope, hope fosters me in vain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hopes are unsure when certain is my pain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXVI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Look in my griefs, and blame me not to mourn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From care to care that leads a life so bad;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Th'orphan of fortune, born to be her scorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose clouded brow doth make my days so sad.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Long are their nights whose cares do never sleep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Loathsome their days who never sun yet joyed;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The impression of her eyes do pierce so deep,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That thus I live both day and night annoyed.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet since the sweetest root yields fruit so sour,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her praise from my complaint I may not part;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I love th'effect, the cause being of this power;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I'll praise her face and blame her flinty heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whilst we both make the world admire at us,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her for disdain, and me for loving thus.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXVII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Reignin my thoughts, fair hand, sweet eye, rare voice!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Possess me whole, my heart's triumvirate!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet heavy heart, to make so hard a choice<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of such as spoil thy poor afflicted state!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For whilst they strive which shall be lord of all,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All my poor life by them is trodden down;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They all erect their trophies on my fall,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And yield me nought that gives them their renown.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When back I look, I sigh my freedom past,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wail the state wherein I present stand,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And see my fortune ever like to last,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Finding me reined with such a heavy hand.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What can I do but yield? and yield I do;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And serve all three, and yet they spoil me too!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXVIII</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Alluding to the sparrow pursued by a hawk, that flew into the bosom of +Zenocrates</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whilst by thy eyes pursued, my poor heart flew<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Into the sacred refuge of thy breast;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy rigour in that sanctuary slew<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That which thy succ'ring mercy should have blest.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No privilege of faith could it protect,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Faith being with blood and five years witness signed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wherein no show gave cause of least suspect,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For well thou saw'st my love and how I pined.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet no mild comfort would thy brow reveal,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No lightning looks which falling hopes erect;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What boots to laws of succour to appeal?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Ladies and tyrants never laws respect.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then there I die from whence my life should come,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And by that hand whom such deeds ill become.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXIX</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Still in the trace of one perplexèd thought,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My ceaseless cares continually run on,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Seeking in vain what I have ever sought,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">One in my love, and her hard heart still one.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I who did never joy in other sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And have no stars but those that must fulfil<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The work of rigour, fatally begun<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon this heart whom cruelty will kill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Injurious Delia!—yet, I love thee still,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And will whilst I shall draw this breath of mine;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I'll tell the world that I deserved but ill,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And blame myself, t'excuse that heart of thine;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">See then who sins the greater of us twain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I in my love, or thou in thy disdain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXX</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oft do I marvel whether Delia's eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are eyes, or else two radiant stars that shine;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For how could nature ever thus devise<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of earth, on earth, a substance so divine?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stars, sure, they are, whose motions rule desires,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And calm and tempest follow their aspects;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Their sweet appearing still such power inspires,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That makes the world admire so strange effects.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet whether fixed or wandering stars are they,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose influence rules the orb of my poor heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fixed, sure, they are, but wandering make me stray<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In endless errors whence I cannot part.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stars, then, not eyes, move you with milder view<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your sweet aspect on him that honours you!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXXI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The star of my mishap imposed this pain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To spend the April of my years in grief;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Finding my fortune ever in the wane,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With still fresh cares, supplied with no relief.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet thee I blame not, though for thee 'tis done;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But these weak wings presuming to aspire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which now are melted by thine eyes' bright sun<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That makes me fall from off my high desire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in my fall I cry for help with speed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No pitying eye looks back upon my fears;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No succour find I now when most I need:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My heats must drown in th'ocean of my tears,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which still must bear the title of my wrong,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Caused by those cruel beams that were so strong.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXXII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">And yet I cannot reprehend the flight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or blame th'attempt, presuming so to soar;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The mounting venture for a high delight<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Did make the honour of the fall the more.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For who gets wealth, that puts not from the shore?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Danger hath honours, great designs their fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Glory doth follow, courage goes before;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And though th'event oft answers not the same,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Suffice that high attempts have never shame.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The mean observer whom base safety keeps,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lives without honour, dies without a name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And in eternal darkness ever sleeps.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And therefore, Delia, 'tis to me no blot<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To have attempted though attained thee not.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXXIII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Raising my hopes on hills of high desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thinking to scale the heaven of her heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My slender means presumed too high a part,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her thunder of disdain forced me retire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And threw me down to pain in all this fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where lo, I languish in so heavy smart<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Because th'attempt was far above my art;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her pride brooked not poor souls should come so nigh her.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet, I protest, my high desiring will<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was not to dispossess her of her right;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her sovereignty should have remainèd still;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I only sought the bliss to have her sight.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her sight, contented thus to see me spill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Framed my desires fit for her eyes to kill.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXXIV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why dost thou, Delia, credit so thy glass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gazing thy beauty deigned thee by the skies,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And dost not rather look on him, alas!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose state best shows the force of murdering eyes?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The broken tops of lofty trees declare<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The fury of a mercy-wanting storm;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And of what force thy wounding graces are<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon myself, you best may find the form.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then leave thy glass, and gaze thyself on me;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That mirror shows what power is in thy face;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To view your form too much may danger be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Narcissus changed t'a flower in such a case.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And you are changed, but not t'a hyacinth;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I fear your eye hath turned your heart to flint.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXXV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I once may see when years shall wreck my wrong,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And golden hairs shall change to silver wire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And those bright rays that kindle all this fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shall fail in force, their working not so strong,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then beauty, now the burden of my song,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose glorious blaze the world doth so admire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Must yield up all to tyrant Time's desire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then fade those flowers that decked her pride so long.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When if she grieve to gaze her in her glass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which then presents her whiter-withered hue,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Go you, my verse, go tell her what she was,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For what she was, she best shall find in you.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your fiery heat lets not her glory pass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But phœnix-like shall make her live anew.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXXVI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Look, Delia, how w'esteem the half-blown rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The image of thy blush, and summer's honour,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whilst yet her tender bud doth undisclose<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That full of beauty time bestows upon her.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No sooner spreads her glory in the air,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But straight her wide-blown pomp comes to decline;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She then is scorned that late adorned the fair;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So fade the roses of those cheeks of thine.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No April can revive thy withered flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose springing grace adorns thy glory now;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Swift speedy time, feathered with flying hours,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dissolves the beauty of the fairest brow.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then do not thou such treasure waste in vain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But love now whilst thou mayst be loved again.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXXVII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But love whilst that thou mayst be loved again,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now whilst thy May hath filled thy lap with flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now whilst thy beauty bears without a stain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now use thy summer smiles, ere winter lowers.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And whilst thou spread'st unto the rising sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The fairest flower that ever saw the light,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now joy thy time before thy sweet be done;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And, Delia, think thy morning must have night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that thy brightness sets at length to west,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When thou wilt close up that which now thou showest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And think the same becomes thy fading best,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which then shall most inveil and shadow most.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Men do not weigh the stalk for that it was,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When once they find her flower, her glory pass.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXXVIII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When men shall find thy flower, thy glory pass,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thou with careful brow sitting alone<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Receivèd hast this message from thy glass<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That tells the truth, and says that all is gone;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fresh shalt thou see in me the wounds thou mad'st,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though spent thy flame, in me the heat remaining.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I that have loved thee thus before thou fad'st,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My faith shall wax when thou art in thy waning.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The world shall find this miracle in me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That fire can burn when all the matter's spent;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then what my faith hath been thyself shalt see,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And that thou wast unkind thou mayst repent.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou mayst repent that thou hast scorned my tears,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When winter snows upon thy sable hairs.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XXXIX</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When winter snows upon thy sable hairs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And frost of age hath nipped thy beauties near,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When dark shall seem thy day that never clears,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And all lies withered that was held so dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then take this picture which I here present thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Limned with a pencil not all unworthy;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Here see the gifts that God and nature lent thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Here read thyself and what I suffered for thee.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This may remain thy lasting monument,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which happily posterity may cherish;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">These colours with thy fading are not spent,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">These may remain when thou and I shall perish.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If they remain, then thou shalt live thereby;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">They will remain, and so thou canst not die.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XL</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou canst not die whilst any zeal abound<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In feeling hearts than can conceive these lines;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though thou a Laura hast no Petrarch found,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In base attire yet clearly beauty shines.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I though born within a colder clime,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Do feel mine inward heat as great—I know it;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He never had more faith, although more rhyme;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I love as well though he could better show it.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I may add one feather to thy fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To help her flight throughout the fairest isle;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And if my pen could more enlarge thy name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then shouldst thou live in an immortal style.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For though that Laura better limnèd be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Suffice, thou shalt be loved as well as she!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XLI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Be not displeased that these my papers should<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bewray unto the world how fair thou art;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or that my wits have showed the best they could<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The chastest flame that ever warmèd heart.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Think not, sweet Delia, this shall be thy shame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My muse should sound thy praise with mournful warble.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How many live, the glory of whose name<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall rest in ice, while thine is graved in marble!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou mayst in after ages live esteemed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unburied in these lines, reserved in pureness;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">These shall entomb those eyes, that have redeemed<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Me from the vulgar, thee from all obscureness.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Although my careful accents never moved thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet count it no disgrace that I loved thee.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XLII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Delia, these eyes that so admireth thine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Have seen those walls which proud ambition reared<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To check the world, how they entombed have lain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Within themselves, and on them ploughs have eared;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet never found that barbarous hand attained<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The spoil of fame deserved by virtuous men,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose glorious actions luckily had gained<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Th'eternal annals of a happy pen.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And therefore grieve not if thy beauties die<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though time do spoil thee of the fairest veil<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That ever yet covered mortality,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And must instar the needle and the rail.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That grace which doth more than inwoman thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lives in my lines and must eternal be.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XLIII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Most fair and lovely maid, look from the shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">See thy Leander striving in these waves,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Poor soul quite spent, whose force can do no more.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now send forth hope, for now calm pity saves,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And waft him to thee with those lovely eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A happy convoy to a holy land.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now show thy power, and where thy virtue lies;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To save thine own, stretch out the fairest hand.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Stretch out the fairest hand, a pledge of peace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That hand that darts so right and never misses;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I shall forget old wrongs, my griefs shall cease;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And that which gave me wounds, I'll give it kisses.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Once let the ocean of my care find shore,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That thou be pleased, and I may sigh no more.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XLIV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Read in my face a volume of despairs,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The wailing Iliads of my tragic woe;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Drawn with my blood, and painted with my cares,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wrought by her hand that I have honoured so.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Who whilst I burn, she sings at my soul's wrack,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Looking aloft from turret of her pride;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There my soul's tyrant joys her in the sack<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of her own seat, whereof I made her guide.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There do these smokes that from affliction rise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Serve as an incense to a cruel dame;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A sacrifice thrice-grateful to her eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Because their power serves to exact the same.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus ruins she to satisfy her will,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The temple where her name was honoured still.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XLV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My Delia hath the waters of mine eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The ready handmaids on her grace t'attend,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That never fail to ebb, but ever rise;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For to their flow she never grants an end.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The ocean never did attend more duly<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon his sovereign's course, the night's pale queen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor paid the impost of his waves more truly,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than mine unto her cruelty hath been.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet nought the rock of that hard heart can move,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where beat these tears with zeal, and fury drives;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And yet, I'd rather languish in her love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than I would joy the fairest she that lives.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And if I find such pleasure to complain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What should I do then if I should obtain?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XLVI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">How long shall I in mine affliction mourn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A burden to myself, distressed in mind;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When shall my interdicted hopes return<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From out despair wherein they live confined?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When shall her troubled brow charged with disdain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Reveal the treasure which her smiles impart?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When shall my faith the happiness attain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To break the ice that hath congealed her heart?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Unto herself, herself my love doth summon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">(If love in her hath any power to move)<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And let her tell me, as she is a woman,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whether my faith hath not deserved her love?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I know her heart cannot but judge with me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Although her eyes my adversaries be.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XLVII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Beauty, sweet love, is like the morning dew,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose short refresh upon the tender green<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cheers for a time but till the sun doth show,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And straight 'tis gone as it had never been.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Soon doth it fade that makes the fairest flourish,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Short is the glory of the blushing rose,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The hue which thou so carefully dost nourish,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet which at length thou must be forced to lose.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When thou, surcharged with burden of thy years,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shalt bend thy wrinkles homeward to the earth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And that in beauty's lease expired appears<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The date of age, the kalends of our death,—<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But ah! no more, this must not be foretold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For women grieve to think they must be old.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XLVIII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I must not grieve my love, whose eyes would read<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lines of delight, whereon her youth might smile;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Flowers have a time before they come to seed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And she is young, and now must sport the while.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Ah sport, sweet maid, in season of these years,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And learn to gather flowers before they wither.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And where the sweetest blossoms first appears,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let love and youth conduct thy pleasures thither.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lighten forth smiles to clear the clouded air,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And calm the tempest which my sighs do raise;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Pity and smiles do best become the fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Pity and smiles shall yield thee lasting praise.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Make me to say, when all my griefs are gone,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Happy the heart that sighed for such a one!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>XLIX</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>At the Author's going into Italy</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ah whither, poor forsaken, wilt thou go,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To go from sorrow and thine own distress,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When every place presents like face of woe,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And no remove can make thy sorrows less!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet go, forsaken! Leave these woods, these plains,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Leave her and all, and all for her that leaves<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thee and thy love forlorn, and both disdains,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And of both wrongful deems and ill conceives.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Seek out some place, and see if any place<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can give the least release unto thy grief;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Convey thee from the thought of thy disgrace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Steal from thyself and be thy cares' own thief.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But yet what comforts shall I hereby gain?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bearing the wound, I needs must feel the pain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>L</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>This Sonnet was made at the Author's being in Italy</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Drawn with th'attractive virtue of her eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My touched heart turns it to that happy coast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My joyful north, where all my fortune lies,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The level of my hopes desirèd most;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">There where my Delia, fairer than the sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Decked with her youth whereon the world doth smile,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Joys in that honour which her eyes have won,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Th'eternal wonder of our happy isle.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Flourish, fair Albion, glory of the north!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Neptune's best darling, held between his arms;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Divided from the world as better worth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Kept for himself, defended from all harms!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still let disarmèd peace deck her and thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And Muse-foe Mars abroad far fostered be!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>LI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Care-charmer sleep, son of the sable night,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Brother to death, in silent darkness born,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Relieve my languish, and restore the light;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With dark forgetting of my care return,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And let the day be time enough to mourn<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The shipwreck of my ill-adventured youth;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let waking eyes suffice to wail their scorn,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Without the torment of the night's untruth.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cease, dreams, the images of day-desires,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To model forth the passions of the morrow;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Never let rising sun approve you liars,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To add more grief to aggravate my sorrow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Still let me sleep, embracing clouds in vain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And never wake to feel the day's disdain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>LII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Let others sing of knights and paladins,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In agèd accents and untimely words,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Paint shadows in imaginary lines<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which well the reach of their high wits records;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I must sing of thee and those fair eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Authentic shall my verse in time to come,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When yet th'unborn shall say, Lo, where she lies,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose beauty made him speak that else was dumb!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">These are the arks, the trophies I erect,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That fortify thy name against old age;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And these thy sacred virtues must protect<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Against the dark and time's consuming rage.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though th'error of my youth in them appear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Suffice, they show I lived and loved thee, dear.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>LIII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As to the Roman that would free his land,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His error was his honour and renown;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And more the fame of his mistaking hand<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than if he had the tyrant overthrown.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So Delia, hath mine error made me known,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And my deceived attempt deserved more fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Than if had the victory mine own,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thy hard heart had yielded up the same.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And so likewise renowned is thy blame;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy cruelty, thy glory; O strange case,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That errors should be graced that merit shame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sin of frowns bring honour to the face.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet happy Delia that thou wast unkind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though happier far, if thou would'st change thy mind.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>LIV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Like as the lute delights or else dislikes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As is his art that plays upon the same,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So sounds my Muse according as she strikes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On my heart-strings high tuned unto her fame.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her touch doth cause the warble of the sound,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which here I yield in lamentable wise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A wailing descant on the sweetest ground,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose due reports give honour to her eyes;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Else harsh my style, untunable my Muse;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hoarse sounds the voice that praiseth not her name;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If any pleasing relish here I use,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then judge the world her beauty gives the same.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For no ground else could make the music such,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor other hand could give so sweet a touch.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>LV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">None other fame mine unambitious Muse<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Affected ever but t'eternise thee;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All other honours do my hopes refuse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which meaner prized and momentary be.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For God forbid I should my papers blot<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With mercenary lines with servile pen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Praising virtues in them that have them not,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Basely attending on the hopes of men.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No, no, my verse respects not Thames, nor theatres;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor seeks it to be known unto the great;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But Avon, poor in fame, and poor in waters,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall have my song, where Delia hath her seat.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Avon shall be my Thames, and she my song;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No other prouder brooks shall hear my wrong.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>LVI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Unhappy pen, and ill-accepted lines<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That intimate in vain my chaste desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My chaste desire, which from dark sorrow shines,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Enkindled by her eyes' celestial fire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Celestial fire, and unrespecting powers<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which pity not the wounds made by their might,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Showed in these lines, the work of careful hours,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The sacrifice here offered to her sight.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But since she weighs them not, this rests for me:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I'll moan myself, and hide the wrong I have,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And so content me that her frowns should be<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To m'infant style the cradle and the grave.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What though my Muse no honour get thereby;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Each bird sings to herself, and so will I.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>LVII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lo here the impost of a faith entire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That love doth pay, and her disdain extorts;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Behold the message of a chaste desire<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That tells the world how much my grief imports.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">These tributary passions, beauty's due,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I send those eyes, the cabinets of love;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That cruelty herself might grieve to view<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Th'affliction her unkind disdain doth move.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And how I live, cast down from off all mirth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Pensive, alone, only but with despair;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My joys abortive perish in their birth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My griefs long-lived and care succeeding care.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This is my state, and Delia's heart is such;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I say no more, I fear I said too much.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span></p> + + +<h3>REJECTED SONNETS</h3> + +<p>[The following four sonnets were Numbers 3, 10, 12 and 16 in Newman's +edition of 1591. They do not appear in any other editions.]</p> + +<h4>I</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The only bird alone that nature frames,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When weary of the tedious life she lives,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By fire dies, yet finds new life in flames,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her ashes to her shape new essence gives.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When only I, the only wretched wight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Weary of life that breathes but sorrow's blast,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Pursue the flame of such a beauty bright,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That burns my heart, and yet my life still lasts.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O sovereign light, that with thy sacred flame<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Consumes my life, revive me after this!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And make me, with the happy bird, the same<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That dies to live, by favour of thy bliss!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This deed of thine will show a goddess' power,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In so long death to grant one living hour.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sly enchanter when to work his will<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And secret wrong on some forespoken wight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Frames wax in form to represent aright<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The poor unwitting wretch he means to kill,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And pricks the image framed by magic's skill,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whereby to vex the party day and night;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like hath she done, whose show bewitched my sight<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To beauty's charms, her lover's blood to spill.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For first, like wax she framed me by her eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose rays sharp-pointed set upon my breast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Martyr my life and plague me in this wise<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With ling'ring pain to perish in unrest.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nought could, save this, my sweetest fair suffice,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To try her art on him that loves her best.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The tablet of my heavy fortunes here<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon thine altar, Paphian Power, I place.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The grievous shipwreck of my travels dear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In bulgèd bark, all perished in disgrace.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That traitor Love was pilot to my woe;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My sails were hope, spread with my sighs of grief;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The twin lights which my hapless course did show<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hard by th'inconstant sands of false relief,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Were two bright stars which led my view apart.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A siren's voice allured me come so near<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To perish on the marble of her heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A danger which my soul did never fear.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lo, thus he fares that trusts a calm too much;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thus fare I whose credit hath been such!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Weigh but the cause, and give me leave to plain me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For all my hurt, that my heart's queen hath wrought it;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She whom I love so dear, the more to pain me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Withholds my right where I have dearly bought it.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dearly I bought that was so slightly rated,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Even with the price of blood and body's wasting;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She would not yield that ought might be abated,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For all she saw my love was pure and lasting,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And yet now scorns performance of the passion,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And with her presence justice overruleth.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">She tells me flat her beauty bears no action;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And so my plea and process she excludeth.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What wrong she doth, the world may well perceive it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To accept my faith at first, and then to leave it.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p> </p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span></p> + +<p>[This sonnet was Number 8 in Newman's edition of 1591, is found in the +editions of '92 and '94, but was omitted thereafter.]</p> + +<h4>V</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Oft and in vain my rebel thoughts have ventured<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To stop the passage of my vanquished heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And shut those ways my friendly foe first entered,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hoping thereby to free my better part.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And whilst I guard the windows of this fort,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where my heart's thief to vex me made her choice,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thither all my forces do transport,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Another passage opens at her voice.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her voice betrays me to her hand and eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My freedom's tyrant, conquering all by art;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But ah! what glory can she get thereby,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">With three such powers to plague one silly heart!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet my soul's sovereign, since I must resign,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Reign in my thoughts, my love and life are thine!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p> </p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span></p> + + +<p>[The following two sonnets appear for the first time in the second +edition of 1592, where they are marked 31 and 30, the 30 being evidently +a misprint for 32. They are not found in later editions.]</p> + +<h4>VI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Like as the spotless ermelin distressed<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Circumpassed round with filth and lothsome mud,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Pines in her grief, imprisoned to her nest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And cannot issue forth to seek her good;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So I invironed with a hatefull want,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Look to the heavens; the heavens yield forth no grace;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I search the earth, the earth I find as scant,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I view myself, myself in wofull case.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Heaven nor earth will not, myself cannot make<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A way through want to free my soul from care;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But I must pine, and in my pining lurk<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lest my sad looks bewray me how I fare.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My fortune mantled with a cloud s'obscure,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus shades my life so long as wants endure.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My cares draw on mine everlasting night,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In horror's sable clouds sets my life's sun;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My life's sweet sun, my dearest comfort's light<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall rise no more to me whose day is done.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I'll go before unto the myrtle shades,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">T'attend the presence of my world's dear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And there prepare her flowers that never fades,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And all things fit against her coming there.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If any ask me why so soon I came,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I'll hide her sin and say it was my lot.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In life and death I'll tender her good name;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My life nor death shall never be her blot.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Although this world may seem her deed to blame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The Elysian ghosts shall never know the same.<br /></span> +</div></div> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h1>DIANA</h1> + +<h3>BY</h3> + +<h2>HENRY CONSTABLE</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span></p> +<h2>HENRY CONSTABLE</h2> + + +<p>The sonnet-cycle in the hands of Henry Constable seems to have been in +the first place rather a record of a succession of "moment's monuments" +than a single dramatic scheme, even an embryonic one. The quaint preface +found in the Harleian transcript of the <i>Diana</i> shows this, and at the +same time tells what freedom was at that period allowed in the structure +and dove-tailing of a sonnet-cycle. It is as follows:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"The Sonnets following are divided into 3 parts, each parte +contayning 3 several arguments and every argument 7 sonets.</p> + +<p>"The first parte is of variable affections of love: wherein the +first 7 be of the beginning and byrth of his love; the second 7, of +the prayse of his<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> mistresse; the thyrd 7, of severall accidents +hapning in the tyme of his love.</p> + +<p>"The second is the prayse of perticulars: wherein the first 7 be of +the generall honoure of this ile, through the prayses of the heads +thereof, the Q. of England and K. of Scots; the second 7 celebrate +the memory of perticular ladies whoe the author most honoureth: the +thyrd 7 be to the honoure of perticulars, presented upon severall +occasions.</p> + +<p>"The thyrd parte is tragicall, conteyning only lamentations: +wherein the first 7 be complaynts onlye of misfortunes in love, the +second 7, funerall sonets of the death of perticulars; the last 7, +of the end and death of his love."</p></div> + +<p>The four sonnets to that distinguished "perticular," the King of +Scotland, seem to have won for the author a great deal of fame, for +Bolton mentions one of them as a witness to his opinion that "noble +Henry Constable was a great master in English tongue, nor had any +gentleman of our nation a more pure, quick, or higher delivery of +conceit." The King himself the poet is said to<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> have met personally when +on his propagandist tours in Scotland; for Constable was an ardent Roman +Catholic, and spent most of his life in plots for the re-establishment +of that faith in England. Among the other "perticulars" addressed, the +Queen is of course bounteously favoured, and a number of ladies of her +Court are honoured; the series therefore lacks all pretense of unity. In +fact, the title of the 1594 edition declares that the "excellent +conceitful sonnets of Henry Constable" are "augmented with divers +quartorzains of honourable and learned personages;" and Sidney has been +found to be one of the "honourable and learned personages" whose works +were laid under contribution to make the book; but since the whole first +and second decades are the same as in the earlier volume by "H.C." which +contained also the King James sonnets attributed by numerous +contemporaries to Henry Constable, and since as yet, beside the ten by +Sidney, no more of the sonnets have by antiquarian research been traced +to their sources in the mazes of Elizabethan common-place books, it +seems but fair to leave the <i>Diana</i> of 1594 in the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> hands of Constable. +All three books, the '92 and '94 editions and the manuscript volume, +show a like taste for orderly arrangement not found in general in the +sonnet-cycles.</p> + +<p>Constable was a Cambridge man and was thirty years old when the <i>Diana</i> +was first printed. He lived until 1613 and bore an excellent reputation +in his day. He was the friend of Ben Jonson, who speaks of his +"ambrosaic Muse," of Sidney, Harington, Tofte, and other literary men. +If toying with the sonnet in <i>Diana</i> seems to indicate a light and +trifling spirit, we have to yield that with Constable as with Fletcher +the graver matters of state policy formed the chief interest in life to +the author. In Constable's case the interest was religious and the poet +was personally a man of devout feeling. Writing from the Tower, where +for a time he was detained, he says, "Whether I remain in prison or go +out, I have learned to live alone with God." At the conclusion of the +third part of the Harleian Miscellany transcript, the author says: "When +I had ended this last sonnet, and found that such vain poems as I had by +idle hours writ, did amount just to the<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> diametrical number 63, +methought it was high time for my folly to die, and to employ the +remnant of my wit to other calmer thoughts less sweet and less bitter." +It was probably in a mood like this that the poet turned from his +devotion to an earthly love and began to write his "Sonnets in honor of +God and his Saints." In this group, as in the other, he expresses that +passion for beauty characteristic of the renaissance, but here he shows +the lack of a clear conception as to where the line should be drawn +between earthly and heavenly beauty. In Constable we see the new +revelation barely emerging from the darkness, the human hand reaching +out in art toward the divine, but not knowing how to take and hold the +higher in its grasp. These sonnets are as "conceitful" as the others, +but the collection illustrates an early effort to turn the poetic energy +into a new field, to broaden the scope of subject-matter possible in +sonnet-form. The poet was evidently a close student of the +sonnet-structure. He used the Italian and the English form in about an +equal number of cases but he experiments on a large variety of +rime-arrangements besides.<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span></p> + +<p>As to the personality honoured under the name of Diana, there seems to +be much obscurity. From the sonnet <i>To his Mistress</i>, we learn that +though he addresses several he loves but one.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Grace full of grace, though in these verses here<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My love complains of others than of thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet thee alone I loved, and they by me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou yet unknown, only mistaken were."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>So he loved her, it seems, while she was "yet unknown," something quite +possible in the sonneteer's world: and her personality, though shadowed +under various names, is to the poet a distinct conception. To the honour +of being this poet's inspirer, there are two claimants; one the Lady +Rich, the Stella of Sidney, the other the ill-fated Arabella Stuart. It +is noteworthy that the only one of all the sonnets addressed personally +to particular ladies that is retained in the edition of 1594, is one to +Lady Rich. But this sonnet tells us little except that "wishèd fortune" +had once made it possible for him to see her in all her beauty of roses +and lilies, stars and waves of gold: but this might have happened if he +had once seen that beauteous lady pass along<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> the street in the queen's +glittering train. Other sonnets to or about the Lady Rich are equally +uncommunicative; and if the ill-starred Penelope Devereux is the one +alone that Constable loved, Time has shut the secret tightly in his +heart and will not give it up.</p> + +<p>The other guess is but little nearer to certainty. During the years that +Constable was pursuing his shadowy schemes, Arabella Stuart was an +object of admiration and of political jealousy; the house where she +lived was constantly spied upon, her very tutors were suspected, the +wildest schemes were formed upon her royal connections, and it would not +be strange if the heart of our poetical zealot turned toward this star +of his cause. We may be sure that he would not have been averse to a +clandestine meeting, for in writing to that arch-plotter, the Countess +of Shrewsbury, Arabella's doting grandmother, he says: "It is more +convenient to write unto your Ladyship, than to come unto you or to make +any other visits either by day or night till I have further liberty +granted me;" besides this, the Earl of Shrewsbury was distantly related +to Constable's family, and this<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> fact of kinship may have opened the +way; while his sonnet to the Countess intimates that his heart had been +touched by some beauty in her Venus' camp. If not Arabella, who could +this be?</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"To you then, you, the fairest of the wise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wisest of the fair I do appeal.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A warrior of your camp by force of eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Me prisoner took, and will with rigour deal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Except you pity in your heart will place,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">At whose white hands I only seek for grace."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>As before, the sonnets addressed to Arabella give no definite +information. The first is in the usual strain of praise, and closes:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i10">"My drift was this,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Some earthly shadow of thy worth to show<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose heavenly self above world's reason is."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The second is as follows:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"Only hope of our age, that virtues dead<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By your sweet breath should be revived again;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Learning discouraged long by rude disdain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By your white hands is only cherishèd.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus others' worth by you is honourèd.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But who shall honour yours? Poor wits, in vain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">We seek to pay the debts which you pertain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Till from yourself some wealth be borrowèd.<br /></span> +<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> +<span class="i0">Lend some your tongues, that every nation may<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In his own hear your virtuous praises blaze;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lend them your wit, your judgment, memory,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lest they themselves should not know what to say;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that thou mayst be loved as much as praised,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart thou mayst lend them which I gave thee."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The last of Constable's sonnets in the edition of 1592 is this +dedicatory address:</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">"My mistress' worth gave wings unto my muse<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And my muse wings did give unto her name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So, like twin birds, my muse bred with her fame<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Together now do learn their wings to use.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in this book, which here you may peruse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Abroad they fly, resolved to try the same<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Adventure in their flight; and thee, sweet dame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Both she and I for our protection choose;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I by my vow, and she by farther right<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Under your phœnix (wing) presume to fly;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That from all carrion beaks in safety might<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By one same wing be shrouded, she and I.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O happy, if I might but flitter there<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where you and she and I should be so near."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p>The value of this author's praise, however, is somewhat impaired by the +extravagances in certain<span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> sonnets where, for instance, he honours a lady +whose soul, he says, was "endued in her lifetime with infinite +perfections as her divine poems do testify," when she on earth did sing +poet-wise angels in heaven prayed for her company, and when she died, +her "fair and glittering rays increased the light of heaven;" where +again he calls on the Countess of Essex to revenge the death of her +first husband, Sir Philip Sidney, upon the Spanish people by murdering +them <i>en masse</i> with her eyes, and where he calls the Countess of +Shrewsbury "chieftain of Venus's host," and places her crowned in heaven +beside the Virgin Mary. Constable's zealous publisher was not far wrong +when he claimed that in this poet "conceit first claimed his birthright +to enjoy," and since we do not find either in the sonnets to Lady Rich +or in those to Lady Arabella any special tone of sincerity that leads us +to have confidence in our conjecture, we shall be compelled to leave +this puzzle unsolved.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /><p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span></p> +<h2>DIANA</h2> + +<h3>UNTO HER MAJESTY'S SACRED HONOURABLE MAIDS</h3> + + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Eternal Twins! that conquer death and time,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Perpetual advocates in heaven and earth!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fair, chaste, immaculate, and all divine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Glorious alone, before the first man's birth;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Your twofold charities, celestial lights,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bow your sun-rising eyes, planets of joy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon these orphan poems; in whose rights<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Conceit first claimed his birthright to enjoy.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If, pitiful, you shun the song of death,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or fear the stain of love's life-dropping blood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O know then, you are pure; and purer faith<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall still keep white the flower, the fruit, and bud.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Love moveth all things. You that love, shall move<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All things in him, and he in you shall love.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p class="right"><span class="smcap">Richard Smith</span>.<a name="FNanchor_A_1" id="FNanchor_A_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_A_1" class="fnanchor">[A]</a></p> +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span></p> + +<h4>TO HIS MISTRESS</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Grace full of grace, though in these verses here<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My love complains of others than of thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet thee alone I loved, and they by me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou yet unknown, only mistaken were.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Like him which feels a heat now here now there,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Blames now this cause now that, until he see<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The fire indeed from whence they causèd be;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which fire I now do know is you, my dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus diverse loves dispersèd in my verse<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In thee alone for ever I unite,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And fully unto thee more to rehearse;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To him I fly for grace that rules above,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That by my grace I may live in delight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or by his grace I never more may love.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>TO HIS ABSENT DIANA</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Severed from sweet content, my live's sole light,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Banished by over-weening wit from my desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">This poor acceptance only I require:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That though my fault have forced me from thy sight<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet that thou would'st, my sorrows to requite,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Review these sonnets, pictures of thy praise;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wherein each woe thy wondrous worth doth raise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though first thy worth bereft me of delight.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">See them forsaken; for I them forsook,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Forsaken first of thee, next of my sense;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And when thou deign'st on their black tears to look,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shed not one tear, my tears to recompence;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But joy in this, though fate 'gainst me repine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My verse still lives to witness thee divine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span></p> + + +<h3>THE FIRST DECADE</h3> + +<h4>I</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Only of the birth and beginning of love</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Resolved to love, unworthy to obtain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I do no favour crave; but, humble wise,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To thee my sighs in verse I sacrifice,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Only some pity and no help to gain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hear then, and as my heart shall aye remain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A patient object to thy lightning eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A patient ear bring thou to thund'ring cries;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fear not the crack, when I the blow sustain.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So as thine eye bred mine ambitious thought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So shall thine ear make proud my voice for joy.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lo, dear, what wonders great by thee are wrought,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When I but little favour do enjoy!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The voice is made the ear for to rejoice,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And your ear giveth pleasure to my voice.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>An excuse to his mistress for resolving to love so worthy a creature</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Blame not my heart for flying up so high,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sith thou art cause that it this flight begun;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For earthly vapours drawn up by the sun,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Comets become, and night suns in the sky.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mine humble heart, so with thy heavenly eye<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Drawn up aloft, all low desires doth shun;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Raise thou me up, as thou my heart hast done,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So during night in heaven remain may I.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I say again, blame not my high desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sith of us both the cause thereof depends.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In thee doth shine, in me doth burn a fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fire draws up other, and itself ascends.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thine eye a fire, and so draws up my love;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My love a fire, and so ascends above.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the birth of his love</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fly low, dear love, thy sun dost thou not see?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Take heed, do not so near his rays aspire;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lest, for thy pride, inflamed with wreakful ire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It burn thy wings, as it hath burnèd me.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou haply sayst thy wings immortal be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And so cannot consumèd be with fire;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And one is hope, the other is desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that the heavens bestowed them both on thee.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A muse's words made thee with hope to fly,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">An angel's face desire hath begot,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thyself engendered by a goddess' eye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet for all this, immortal thou art not.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of heavenly eye though thou begotten art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet art thou born but of a mortal heart.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IV</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of his mistress, upon occasion of a friend of his which dissuaded him +from loving</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A friend of mine, pitying my hopeless love,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hoping by killing hope my love to stay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Let not," quoth he, "thy hope, thy heart betray;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Impossible it is her heart to move."<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But sith resolvèd love cannot remove<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As long as thy divine perfections stay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy godhead then he sought to take away.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dear, seek revenge and him a liar prove;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gods only do impossibilities.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Impossible," saith he, "thy grace to gain."<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Show then the power of divinities<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By granting me thy favour to obtain.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So shall thy foe give to himself the lie;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A goddess thou shall prove, and happy I!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>V</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the conspiracy of his lady's eyes and his own to engender love</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thine eye the glass where I behold my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mine eye the window through the which thine eye<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May see my heart, and there thyself espy<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In bloody colours how thou painted art.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thine eye the pile is of a murdering dart;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mine eye the sight thou tak'st thy level by<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To hit my heart, and never shoot'st awry.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mine eye thus helps thine eye to work my smart.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thine eye a fire is both in heat and light;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mine eye of tears a river doth become.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O that the water of mine eye had might<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To quench the flames that from thine eye doth come,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or that the fires kindled by thine eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The flowing streams of mine eyes could make dry.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VI</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Love's seven deadly sins</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Mine eye with all the deadly sins is fraught.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">First <i>proud</i>, sith it presumed to look so high.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A watchman being made, stood gazing by,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And <i>idle</i>, took no heed till I was caught.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And <i>envious</i>, bears envy that by thought<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Should in his absence be to her so nigh.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To kill my heart, mine eye let in her eye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And so consent gave to a <i>murder</i> wrought.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And <i>covetous</i>, it never would remove<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From her fair hair, gold so doth please his sight.<br /></span> +<span class="i2"><i>Unchaste</i>, a baud between my heart and love.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A <i>glutton</i> eye, with tears drunk every night.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">These sins procurèd have a goddess' ire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wherefore my heart is damned in love's sweet fire.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VII</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the slander envy gives him for so highly praising his mistress</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Falsely doth envy of your praises blame<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My tongue, my pen, my heart of flattery,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Because I said there was no sun but thee.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It called my tongue the partial trump of fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And saith my pen hath flatterèd thy name,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Because my pen did to my tongue agree;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And that my heart must needs a flatterer be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which taught both tongue and pen to say the same.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No, no, I flatter not when thee I call<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The sun, sith that the sun was never such;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But when the sun thee I compared withal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Doubtless the sun I flatterèd too much.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Witness mine eyes, I say the truth in this,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They have seen thee and know that so it is.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VIII</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the end and death of his love</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Much sorrow in itself my love doth move,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">More my despair to love a hopeless bliss,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My folly most to love whom sure to miss<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O help me, but this last grief to remove;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All pains, if you command, it joy shall prove,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And wisdom to seek joy. Then say but this,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"Because my pleasure in thy torment is,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I do command thee without hope to love!"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So when this thought my sorrow shall augment<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That my own folly did procure my pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then shall I say to give myself content,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Obedience only made me love in vain.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">It was your will, and not my want of wit;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I have the pain, bear you the blame of it!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IX</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Upon occasion of her walking in a garden</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My lady's presence makes the roses red,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Because to see her lips they blush with shame.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The lily's leaves for envy pale became,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And her white hands in them this envy bred.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The marigold the leaves abroad doth spread,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Because the sun's and her power is the same.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The violet of purple colour came,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dyed in the blood she made my heart to shed.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In brief, all flowers from her their virtue take;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From her sweet breath their sweet smells do proceed;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The living heat which her eyebeams doth make<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Warmeth the ground and quickeneth the seed.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The rain wherewith she watereth the flowers,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Falls from mine eyes which she dissolves in showers.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>X</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>To the Lady Rich</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Heralds at arms do three perfections quote,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To wit, most fair, most rich, most glittering;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So when those three concur within one thing,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Needs must that thing of honour be a note.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lately I did behold a rich fair coat,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which wishèd fortune to mine eyes did bring.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A lordly coat, yet worthy of a king,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In which one might all these perfections note.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A field of lilies, roses proper bare;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Two stars in chief; the crest was waves of gold.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How glittering 'twas, might by the stars appear;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lilies made it fair for to behold.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And rich it was as by the gold appeareth;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But happy he that in his arms it weareth!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span></p> + + +<h3>THE SECOND DECADE</h3> + +<h4>I</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the end and death of his love</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If true love might true love's reward obtain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dumb wonder only might speak of my joy;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But too much worth hath made thee too much coy,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And told me long ago I sighed in vain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not then vain hope of undeservèd gain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hath made me paint in verses mine annoy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But for thy pleasure, that thou might'st enjoy<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy beauty's praise, in glasses of my pain.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">See then, thyself, though me thou wilt not hear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By looking on my verse. For pain in verse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Love doth in pain, beauty in love appear.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">So if thou would'st my verses' meaning see,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Expound them thus, when I my love rehearse:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"None loves like he!" that is, "None fair like me!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>How he encouraged himself to proceed in love, and to hope for favour in +the end at love's hands</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">It may be, love my death doth not pretend,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Although he shoots at me, but thinks it fit<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thus to bewitch thee for thy benefit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Causing thy will to my wish to condescend.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For witches which some murder do intend,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Do make a picture and do shoot at it;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And in that part where they the picture hit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The party's self doth languish to his end.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So love, too weak by force thy heart to taint,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Within my heart thy heavenly shape doth paint;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Suffering therein his arrows to abide,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Only to th'end he might by witches' art,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Within my heart pierce through thy picture's side,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And through thy picture's side might wound my heart.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the thoughts he nourished by night when she was retired to bed</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The sun, his journey ending in the west,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Taketh his lodging up in Thetis' bed;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though from our eyes his beams be banishèd,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet with his light th' antipodes be blest.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now when the sun-time brings my sun to rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which me too oft of rest hath hinderèd,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And whiter skin with white sheet coverèd,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And softer cheek doth on soft pillow rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then I, O sun of suns! and light of lights!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wish me with those antipodes to be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which see and feel thy beams and heat by nights.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Well, though the night both cold and darksome is,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet half the day's delight the night grants me,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">I feel my sun's heat, though his light I miss.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IV</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of his lady's praise</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lady, in beauty and in favour rare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of favour, not of due, I favour crave.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nature to thee beauty and favour gave;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fair then thou art, and favour thou may'st spare.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor when on me bestowed your favours are,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Less favour in your face you shall not have;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If favour then a wounded soul may save,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of murder's guilt, dear Lady, then beware.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My loss of life a million fold were less<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than the least loss should unto you befall;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet grant this gift; which gift when I possess,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Both I have life and you no loss at all.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For by your favour only I do live,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And favour you may well both keep and give.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>V</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the end and death of his love</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My reason absent did mine eyes require<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To watch and ward and such foes to descry<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As they should ne'er my heart approaching spy;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But traitor eyes my heart's death did conspire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Corrupted with hope's gifts; let in desire<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To burn my heart; and sought no remedy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though store of water were in either eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which well employed, might well have quenched the fire.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Reason returnèd; love and fortune made<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Judges, to judge mine eyes to punishment.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fortune, sith they by sight my heart betrayed<br /></span> +<span class="i0">From wishèd sight, adjudged them banishment;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Love, sith by fire murdered my heart was found,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Adjudgèd them in tears for to be drowned.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VI</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of several complaints of misfortune in love only</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wonder it is and pity is't that she<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In whom all beauty's treasure we may find,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That may unrich the body and the mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Towards the poor should use no charity.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My love has gone a begging unto thee.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And if that beauty had not been more kind<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That pity, long ere this he had been pined;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But beauty is content his food to be.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O pity have when such poor orphans beg!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Love, naked boy, hath nothing on his back;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And though he wanteth neither arm nor leg,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet maimed he is sith he his sight doth lack.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And yet though blind he beauty can behold,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And yet though naked he feels more heat than cold.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VII</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of several complaints of misfortune in love only</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Pity refusing my poor love to feed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A beggar starved for want of help he lies;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And at your mouth, the door of beauty, cries,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That thence some alms of sweet grants might proceed.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But as he waiteth for some almès deed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A cherry tree before the door he spies.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"O dear," quoth he, "two cherries may suffice.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Two only may save life in this my need."<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But beggars, can they nought but cherries eat?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pardon my love, he is a goddess' son,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And never feedeth but on dainty meat,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Else need he not to pine, as he hath done;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For only the sweet fruit of this sweet tree<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Can give food to my love and life to me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VIII</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of his lady's veil wherewith she covered her</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The fowler hides as closely as he may<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The net, where caught the silly bird should be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lest he the threatening poison should but see,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And so for fear be forced to fly away.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My lady so, the while she doth assay<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In curlèd knots fast to entangle me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Put on her veil, to th' end I should not flee<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The golden net wherein I am a prey.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Alas, most sweet! what need is of a net<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To catch a bird that is already ta'en?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sith with your hand alone you may it get,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For it desires to fly into the same.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">What needs such art my thoughts then to entrap,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">When of themselves they fly into your lap?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IX</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>To his lady's hand upon occasion of her glove which in her absence he +kissed</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweet hand, the sweet but cruel bow thou art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From whence at me five ivory arrows fly;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So with five wounds at once I wounded lie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bearing my breast the print of every dart.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Saint Francis had the like, yet felt no smart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where I in living torments never die.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His wounds were in his hands and feet; where I<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All these five helpless wounds feel in my heart.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Now, as Saint Francis, if a saint am I,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The bow that shot these shafts a relic is;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I mean the hand, which is the reason why<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So many for devotion thee would kiss:<br /></span> +<span class="i4">And some thy glove kiss as a thing divine,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">This arrows' quiver, and this relic's shrine.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>X</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of his lady's going over early to bed, so depriving him too soon of her +sight</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fair sun, if you would have me praise your light,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When night approacheth wherefore do you fly?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Time is so short, beauties so many be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As I have need to see them day and night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That by continual view my verses might<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Tell all the beams of your divinity;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which praise to you and joy should be to me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You living by my verse, I by your sight;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I by your sight, and not you by my verse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Need mortal skill immortal praise rehearse?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No, no, though eyes were blind, and verse were dumb,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your beauty should be seen and your fame known;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For by the wind which from my sighs do come,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Your praises round about the world are blown.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span></p> + + +<h3>THE THIRD DECADE</h3> + +<h4>I</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Complaint of his lady's sickness</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Uncivil sickness, hast thou no regard,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But dost presume my dearest to molest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And without leave dar'st enter in that breast<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whereto sweet love approach yet never dared?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Spare thou her health, which my life hath not spared;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Too bitter such revenge of my unrest!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Although with wrongs my thought she hath opprest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My wrongs seek not revenge, they crave reward<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cease, sickness, cease in her then to remain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And come and welcome, harbour thou in me<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whom love long since hath taught to suffer in!<br /></span> +<span class="i4">So she which hath so oft my pain increased,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O God, that I might so revengèd be,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">By my poor pain might have her pain released!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span></p> + + +<p>[The Sonnets numbered II to VIII in this Decade are by Sidney, and were +printed among the <i>Certaine Sonets</i> in the 1598 edition of the +<i>Arcadia</i>.]</p> + + +<h4>IX</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Woe to mine eyes, the organs of mine ill;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hate to my heart, for not concealing joy;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A double curse upon my tongue be still,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose babbling lost what else I might enjoy!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When first mine eyes did with thy beauty joy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They to my heart thy wondrous virtues told;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who, fearing lest thy beams should him destroy,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whate'er he knew, did to my tongue unfold.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My tell-tale tongue, in talking over bold,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What they in private council did declare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To thee, in plain and public terms unrolled;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And so by that made thee more coyer far.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What in thy praise he spoke, that didst thou trust;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And yet my sorrows thou dost hold unjust.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>X</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Of an Athenian young man have I read,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who on blind fortune's picture doated so,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That when he could not buy it to his bed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">On it he gazing died for very woe.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My fortune's picture art thou, flinty dame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That settest golden apples to my sight;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But wilt by no means let me taste the same.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To drown in sight of land is double spite.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Of fortune as thou learn'dst to be unkind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So learn to be unconstant to disdain.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The wittiest women are to sport inclined.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Honour is pride, and pride is nought but pain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Let others boast of choosing for the best;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Tis substances not names must make us blest.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span></p> + + +<h3>THE FOURTH DECADE</h3> + +<h4>I</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the end and death of his love</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Needs must I leave and yet needs must I love;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In vain my wit doth tell in verse my woe;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Despair in me, disdain in thee, doth show<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How by my wit I do my folly prove.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">All this my heart from love can never move.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Love is not in my heart. No, Lady, no,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My heart is love itself. Till I forego<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart I never can my love remove.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How can I then leave love? I do intend<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Not to crave grace, but yet to wish it still;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Not to praise thee, but beauty to commend;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And so, by beauty's praise, praise thee I will;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For as my heart is love, love not in me,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">So beauty thou, beauty is not in thee.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the prowess of his lady</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sweet sovereign, since so many minds remain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Obedient subjects at thy beauty's call,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So many hearts bound in thy hairs as thrall,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So many eyes die with one look's disdain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Go, seek the honour that doth thee pertain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That the Fifth Monarchy may thee befall!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou hast such means to conquer men withal,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As all the world must yield or else be slain.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To fight, thou need'st no weapons but thine eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thine hair hath gold enough to pay thy men,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And for their food thy beauty will suffice;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For men and armour, Lady, care have none;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For one will sooner yield unto thee then<br /></span> +<span class="i4">When he shall meet thee naked all alone.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the discouragement he had to proceed in love, through the multitude +of his lady's perfections and his own lowness</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When your perfections to my thoughts appear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They say among themselves, "O happy we,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whichever shall so rare an object see!"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But happy heart, if thoughts less happy were!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For their delights have cost my heart full dear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In whom of love a thousand causes be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And each cause breeds a thousand loves in me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And each love more than thousand hearts can bear.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How can my heart so many loves then hold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which yet by heaps increase from day to day?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But like a ship that's o'ercharged with gold,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Must either sink or hurl the gold away.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But hurl not love; thou canst not, feeble heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">In thine own blood, thou therefore drownèd art!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fools be they that inveigh 'gainst Mahomet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who's but a moral of love's monarchy.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But a dull adamant, as straw by jet,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He in an iron chest was drawn on high.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In midst of Mecca's temple roof, some say,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He now hangs without touch or stay at all.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That Mahomet is she to whom I pray;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May ne'er man pray so ineffectual!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mine eyes, love's strange exhaling adamants,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Un'wares, to my heart's temple's height have wrought<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The iron idol that compassion wants,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who my oft tears and travails sets at nought.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Iron hath been transformed to gold by art;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her face, limbs, flesh and all, gold; save her heart.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>V</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ready to seek out death in my disgrace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My mistress 'gan to smooth her gathered brows,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whereby I am reprievèd for a space.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O hope and fear! who half your torments knows?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">It is some mercy in a black-mouthed judge<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To haste his prisoner's end, if he must die.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dear, if all other favour you shall grudge,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Do speedy execution with your eye;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">With one sole look you leave in me no soul!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Count it a loss to lose a faithful slave.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Would God, that I might hear my last bell toll,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So in your bosom I might dig a grave!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Doubtful delay is worse than any fever,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or help me soon, or cast me off for ever!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VI</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the end and death of his love</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Each day, new proofs of new despair I find,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That is, new deaths. No marvel then, though I<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Make exile my last help; to th'end mine eye<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Should not behold the death to me assigned.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not that from death absence might save my mind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But that it might take death more patiently;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Like him, the which by judge condemned to die,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To suffer with more ease, his eyes doth blind.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Your lips in scarlet clad, my judges be,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pronouncing sentence of eternal "No!"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Despair, the hangman that tormenteth me;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">The death I suffer is the life I have.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For only life doth make me die in woe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And only death I for my pardon crave.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The richest relic Rome did ever view<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Was' Cæsar's tomb; on which, with cunning hand,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Jove's triple honours, the three fair Graces, stand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Telling his virtues in their virtues true.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This Rome admired; but dearest dear, in you<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dwelleth the wonder of the happiest land,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And all the world to Neptune's furthest strand,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For what Rome shaped hath living life in you.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy naked beauty, bounteously displayed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Enricheth monarchies of hearts with love;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thine eyes to hear complaints are open laid;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thine eyes' kind looks requite all pains I prove;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">That of my death I dare not thee accuse;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">But pride in me that baser chance refuse.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VIII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Why thus unjustly, say, my cruel fate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dost thou adjudge my luckless eyes and heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The one to live exiled from that sweet smart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where th' other pines, imprisoned without date?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My luckless eyes must never more debate<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of those bright beams that eased my love apart;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And yet my heart, bound to them with love's dart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Must there dwell ever to bemoan my state.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O had mine eyes been suffered there to rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Often they had my heart's unquiet eased;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or had my heart with banishment been blest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Mine eye with beauty never had been pleased!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But since these cross effects hath fortune wrought,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Dwell, heart, with her; eyes, view her in my thought!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span></p> + + +<p>[The Sonnet numbered IX is by Sidney, and is found in the <i>Certaine +Sonets</i> printed in the 1598 edition of the <i>Arcadia</i>.]</p> + + +<h4>X</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Hope, like the hyaena, coming to be old,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Alters his shape, is turned into despair.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Pity my hoary hopes, Maid of clear mould!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Think not that frowns can ever make thee fair.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What harm is it to kiss, to laugh, to play?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beauty's no blossom, if it be not used.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sweet dalliance keeps the wrinkles long away;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Repentance follows them that have refused.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To bring you to the knowledge of your good,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I seek, I sue. O try and then believe!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Each image can be chaste that's carved of wood.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">You show you live, when men you do relieve.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Iron with wearing shines; rust wasteth treasure.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">On earth but love there is no other pleasure.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span></p> + + +<h3>THE FIFTH DECADE</h3> + +<h4>I</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Ay me, poor wretch, my prayer is turned to sin!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I say, "I love!" My mistress says "'Tis lust!"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thus most we lose where most we seek to win.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wit will make wicked what is ne'er so just.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And yet I can supplant her false surmise.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lust is a fire that for an hour or twain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Giveth a scorching blaze and then he dies;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Love a continual furnace doth maintain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A furnace! Well, this a furnace may be called;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For it burns inward, yields a smothering flame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sighs which, like boiled lead's smoking vapour, scald.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I sigh apace at echo of sighs' name.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Long have I served; no short blaze is my love.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Hid joys there are that maids scorn till they prove.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I do not now complain of my disgrace,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O cruel fair one! fair with cruel crost;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor of the hour, season, time, nor place;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor of my foil, for any freedom lost;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor of my courage, by misfortune daunted;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor of my wit, by overweening struck;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor of my sense, by any sound enchanted;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor of the force of fiery-pointed hook;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nor of the steel that sticks within my wound;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor of my thoughts, by worser thoughts defaced;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Nor of the life I labour to confound.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But I complain, that being thus disgraced,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Fired, feared, frantic, fettered, shot through, slain,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My death is such as I may not complain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If ever sorrow spoke from soul that loves,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As speaks a spirit in a man possest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In me her spirit speaks. My soul it moves,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose sigh-swoll'n words breed whirlwinds in my breast;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or like the echo of a passing bell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which sounding on the water seems to howl;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So rings my heart a fearful heavy knell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And keeps all night in consort with the owl.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My cheeks with a thin ice of tears are clad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mine eyes like morning stars are bleared and red.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What resteth then but I be raging mad,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To see that she, my cares' chief conduit-head,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When all streams else help quench my burning heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Shuts up her springs and will no grace impart.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">You secret vales, you solitary fields,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">You shores forsaken and you sounding rocks!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If ever groaning heart hath made you yield,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or words half spoke that sense in prison locks,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then 'mongst night shadows whisper out my death.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That when myself hath sealed my lips from speaking,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Each tell-tale echo with a weeping breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May both record my truth and true love's breaking.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">You pretty flowers that smile for summer's sake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Pull in your heads before my wat'ry eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Do turn the meadows to a standing lake,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By whose untimely floods your glory dies!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For lo, mine heart, resolved to moistening air,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Feedeth mine eyes which double tear for tear.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>V</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">His shadow to Narcissus well presented,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How fair he was by such attractive love!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So if thou would'st thyself thy beauty prove,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Vulgar breath-mirrors might have well contented,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And to their prayers eternally consented,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Oaths, vows and sighs, if they believe might move;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But more thou forc'st, making my pen approve<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy praise to all, least any had dissented.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When this hath wrought, thou which before wert known<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But unto some, of all art now required,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And thine eyes' wonders wronged, because not shown<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The world, with daily orisons desired.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy chaste fair gifts, with learning's breath is blown,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And thus my pen hath made thy sweets admired.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I am no model figure, or sign of care,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But his eternal heart's-consuming essence,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In whom grief's commentaries written are,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Drawing gross passion into pure quintessence,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Not thine eye's fire, but fire of thine eye's disdain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fed by neglect of my continual grieving,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Attracts the true life's spirit of my pain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And gives it thee, which gives me no relieving.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Within thine arms sad elegies I sing;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unto thine eyes a true heart love-torn lay I:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou smell'st from me the savours sorrows bring;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My tears to taste my truth to touch display I.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lo thus each sense, dear fair one, I importune;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But being care, thou flyest me as ill fortune.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">But being care, thou flyest me as ill fortune;—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Care the consuming canker of the mind!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The discord that disorders sweet hearts' tune!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Th' abortive bastard of a coward mind!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The lightfoot lackey that runs post by death,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bearing the letters which contain our end!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The busy advocate that sells his breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Denouncing worst to him, is most his friend!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O dear, this care no interest holds in me;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But holy care, the guardian of thy fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thine honour's champion, and thy virtue's fee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The zeal which thee from barbarous times shall bear,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This care am I; this care my life hath taken.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dear to my soul, then leave me not forsaken!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VIII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dear to my soul, then, leave, me not forsaken!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fly not! My heart within thy bosom sleepeth;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Even from myself and sense I have betaken<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Me unto thee for whom my spirit weepeth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And on the shore of that salt teary sea,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Couched in a bed of unseen seeming pleasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where in imaginary thoughts thy fair self lay;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But being waked, robbed of my life's best treasure,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I call the heavens, air, earth, and seas to hear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My love, my truth, and black disdained estate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Beating the rocks with bellowings of despair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which still with plaints my words reverberate,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Sighing, "Alas, what shall become of me?"<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whilst echo cries, "What shall become of me?"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IX</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Whilst echo cries, "What shall become of me?"<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And desolate, my desolations pity,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou in thy beauty's carack sitt'st to see<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My tragic downfall, and my funeral ditty.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No timbrel, but my heart thou play'st upon,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose strings are stretched unto the highest key;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The diapason, love; love is the unison;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In love my life and labours waste away.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Only regardless to the world thou leav'st me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whilst slain hopes, turning from the feast of sorrow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unto despair, their king, which ne'er deceives me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Captives my heart, whose black night hates the morrow,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he in truth of my distressed cry<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Plants me a weeping star within mine eye.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>X</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Prometheus for stealing living fire<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From heaven's king, was judged eternal death;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In self-same flame with unrelenting ire<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Bound fast to Caucasus' low foot beneath.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So I, for stealing living beauty's fire<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Into my verse that it may always live,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And change his forms to shapes of my desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou beauty's queen, self sentence like dost give.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Bound to thy feet in chains of life I lie;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For to thine eyes I never dare aspire;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And in thy beauty's brightness do I fry,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As poor Prometheus in the scalding fire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which tears maintain as oil the lamp revives;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Only my succour in thy favour lies.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span></p> + + +<h3>THE SIXTH DECADE</h3> + +<h4>I</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">One sun unto my life's day gives true light.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">One moon dissolves my stormy night of woes.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">One star my fate and happy fortune shows.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One saint I serve, one shrine with vows I dight.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">One sun transfix'd hath burnt my heart outright,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">One moon opposed my love in darkness throws.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">One star hath bid my thoughts my wrongs disclose.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Saints scorn poor swains, shrines do my vows no right.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet if my love be found a holy fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pure, unstained, without idolatry,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And she nathless in hate of my desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lives to repose her in my misery,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My sun, my moon, my star, my saint, my shrine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mine be the torment but the guilt be thine!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">To live in hell, and heaven to behold;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To welcome life, and die a living death;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To sweat with heat, and yet be freezing cold;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To grasp at stars, and lie the earth beneath;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To treat a maze that never shall have end;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To burn in sighs, and starve in daily tears;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To climb a hill, and never to descend;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Giants to kill, and quake at childish fears;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To pine for food, and watch th' Hesperian tree;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To thirst for drink, and nectar still to draw;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To live accurs'd whom men hold blest to be,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And weep those wrongs which never creature saw:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">If this be love, if love in these be founded,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart is love, for these in it are grounded.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">A carver, having loved too long in vain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hewed out the portraiture of Venus' son<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In marble rock, upon the which did rain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Small drizzling drops, that from a fount did run:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Imagining the drops would either wear<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His fury out, or quench his living flame;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But when he saw it bootless did appear,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">He swore the water did augment the same.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So I, that seek in verse to carve thee out,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hoping thy beauty will my flame allay,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Viewing my verse and poems all throughout,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Find my will rather to my love obey,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That with the carver I my work do blame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Finding it still th' augmenter of my flame.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Astronomers the heavens do divide<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Into eight houses, where the god remains;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">All which in thy perfections do abide.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For in thy feet, the queen of silence reigns;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">About thy waist Jove's messenger doth dwell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Inchanting me as I thereat admire;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And on thy dugs the queen of love doth tell<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her godhead's power in scrolls of my desire;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy beauty is the world's eternal sun;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy favours force a coward's heart to dare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And in thy hairs Jove and his riches won.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy frowns hold Saturn; thine's the fixèd stars.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Pardon me then, divine, to love thee well,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Since thou art heaven, and I in heaven would dwell!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>V</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Weary of love, my thoughts of love complained,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till reason told them there was no such power,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And bade me view fair beauty's richest flower,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see if there a naked boy remained.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Dear, to thine eyes, eyes that my soul hath pained,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thoughts turned them back in that unhappy hour<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To see if love kept there his royal bower,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For if not there, then no place him contained.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">There was he not, nor boy, nor golden bow;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet as thou turned thy chaste fair eye aside,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A flame of fire did from thine eyelids go,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which burnt my heart through my sore wounded side;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then with a sigh, reason made thoughts to cry,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">"There is no god of love, save that thine eye!"<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Forgive me, dear, for thundering on thy name;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sure 'tis thyself that shows my love distrest.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For fire exhaled in freezing clouds possessed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Warring for way, makes all the heavens exclaim.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy beauty so, the brightest living flame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wrapt in my cloudy heart, by winter prest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Scorning to dwell within so base a nest,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thunders in me thy everlasting flame.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O that my heart might still contain that fire!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or that the fire would always light my heart!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then should'st thou not disdain my true desire,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Or think I wronged thee to reveal to my smart;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For as the fire through freezing clouds doth break,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So not myself but thou in me would'st speak.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My heart mine eye accuseth of his death,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Saying his wanton sight bred his unrest;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mine eye affirms my heart's unconstant faith<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hath been his bane, and all his joys repressed.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart avows mine eye let in the fire,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which burns him with an everliving light.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Mine eye replies my greedy heart's desire<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Let in those floods, which drown him day and night.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus wars my heart which reason doth maintain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And calls my eye to combat if he dare,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The whilst my soul impatient of disdain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wrings from his bondage unto death more near;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Save that my love still holdeth him in hand;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A kingdom thus divided cannot stand!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VIII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Unhappy day, unhappy month and season,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When first proud love, my joys away adjourning,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Pourèd into mine eye to her eye turning<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A deadly juice, unto my green thought's reason.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Prisoner I am unto the eye I gaze on;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Eternally my love's flame is in burning;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A mortal shaft still wounds me in my mourning;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus prisoned, burnt and slain, the spirit, soul and reason.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What tides me then since these pains which annoy me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">In my despair are evermore increasing?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The more I love, less is my pain's releasing;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That cursèd be the fortune which destroys me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The hour, the month, the season, and the cause,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When love first made me thrall to lovers' laws.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IX</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Love hath I followed all too long, nought gaining;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sighed I have in vain to sweet what smarteth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But from his brow a fiery arrow parteth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thinking that I should him resist not plaining.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But cowardly my heart submiss remaining,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yields to receive what shaft thy fair eye darteth.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Well do I see thine eye my bale imparteth,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And that save death no hope I am detaining.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For what is he can alter fortune's sliding?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">One in his bed consumes his life away,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Other in wars, another in the sea;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The like effects in me have their abiding;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For heavens avowed my fortune should be such,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That I should die by loving far too much.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>X</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My God, my God, how much I love my goddess,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose virtues rare, unto the heavens arise!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My God, my God, how much I love her eyes<br /></span> +<span class="i2">One shining bright, the other full of hardness!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My God, my God, how much I love her wisdom,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose works may ravish heaven's richest maker!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of whose eyes' joys if I might be partaker<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then to my soul a holy rest would come.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My God, how much I love to hear her speak!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose hands I kiss and ravished oft rekisseth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">When she stands wotless whom so much she blesseth.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Say then, what mind this honest love would break;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Since her perfections pure, withouten blot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Makes her beloved of thee, she knoweth not?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span></p> + + +<h3>THE SEVENTH DECADE</h3> + +<h4>I</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">The first created held a joyous bower,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A flowering field, the world's sole wonderment,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">High Paradise, from whence a woman's power<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Enticed him to fall to endless banishment.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">This on the banks of Euphrates did stand,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Till the first Mover, by his wondrous might,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Planted it in thine eyes, thy face, thy hands,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From whence the world receives his fairest light.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy cheeks contain choice flowers; thy eyes, two suns;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy hands, the fruit that no life blood can stain;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And in thy breath, that heavenly music wons,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which, when thou speak'st, angels their voices strain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As from the first thy sex exilèd me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So to this next let me be called by thee!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fair grace of graces, muse of muses all,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thou Paradise, thou only heaven I know!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What influence hath bred my hateful woe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That I from thee and them am forced to fall?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou falled from me, from thee I never shall,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Although my fortunes thou hast brought so low;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet shall my faith and service with thee go,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For live I do, on heaven and thee to call.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Banish'd all grace, no graces with me dwell;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Compelled to muse, my muses from me fly;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Excluded heaven, what can remain but hell?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Exiled from paradise, in hate I lie,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Cursing my stars; albeit I find it true,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I lost all these when I lost love and you.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">What viewed I, dear, when I thine eyes beheld?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Love in his glory? No, him Thyrsis saw,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And stood the boy, whilst he his darts did draw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Whose painted pride to baser swains he telled.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Saw I two suns? That sight is seen but seld.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet can their brood that teach the holy law<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Gaze on their beams, and dread them not a straw,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Where princely looks are by their eyes repelled.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What saw I then? Doubtless it was Amen,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Armed with strong thunder and a lightning's flame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Who bridegroom like with power was riding then,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Meaning that none should see him when he came.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet did I gaze; and thereby caught the wound<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which burns my heart and keeps my body sound.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When tedious much and over weary long,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Cruel disdain reflecting from her brow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Hath been the cause that I endured such wrong<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And rest thus discontent and weary now.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet when posterity in time to come,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Shall find th' uncancelled tenour of her vow,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And her disdain be then confessed of some,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How much unkind and long, I find it now,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O yet even then—though then will be too late<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To comfort me; dead, many a day, ere then—<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They shall confess I did not force her heart;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And time shall make it known to other men<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That ne'er had her disdain made me despair,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Had she not been so excellently fair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>V</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Had she not been so excellently fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">My muse had never mourned in lines of woe;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But I did too inestimable weigh her,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And that's the cause I now lament me so.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet not for her contempt do I complain me:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Complaints may ease the mind, but that is all;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Therefore though she too constantly disdain me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I can but sigh and grieve, and so I shall.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet grieve I not because I must grieve ever;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And yet, alas, waste tears away, in vain;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I am resolvèd truly to persèver,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though she persisteth in her old disdain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But that which grieves me most is that I see<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Those which most fair, the most unkindest be.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VI</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thus long imposed to everlasting plaining,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Divinely constant to the worthiest fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And movèd by eternally disdaining,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Aye to persèver in unkind despair:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Because now silence wearily confined<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In tedious dying and a dumb restraint,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Breaks forth in tears from mine unable mind<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To ease her passion by a poor complaint;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O do not therefore to thyself suggest<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That I can grieve to have immured so long<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Upon the matter of mine own unrest;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Such grief is not the tenour of my song,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That 'bide so zealously so bad a wrong.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My grief is this; unless I speak and plain me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou wilt persèver ever to disdain me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Thou wilt persèver ever to disdain me;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I shall then die, when thou will repent it.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O do not therefore from complaint restrain me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And take my life from me, to me that lent it!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For whilst these accents, weepingly exprest<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In humble lines of reverentest zeal,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Have issue to complaint from mine unrest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They but thy beauty's wonder shall reveal;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And though the grieved muse of some other lover,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose less devotions knew but woes like mine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Would rather seek occasion to discover<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How little pitiful and how much unkind,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">They other not so worthy beauties find.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O, I not so! but seek with humble prayer,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Means how to move th' unmercifullest fair.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VIII</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">As draws the golden meteor of the day<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Exhaled matter from the ground to heaven,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And by his secret nature, there to stay<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The thing fast held, and yet of hold bereaven;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So by th' attractive excellence and might,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Born to the power of thy transparent eyes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Drawn from myself, ravished with thy delight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose dumb conceits divinely sirenise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lo, in suspense of fear and hope upholden,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Diversely poised with passions that pain me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No resolution dares my thoughts embolden,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Since 'tis not I, but thou that dost sustain me.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O if there's none but thou can work my woe,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wilt thou be still unkind and kill me so?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IX</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Wilt thou be still unkind and kill me so,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose humbled vows with sorrowful appeal<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Do still persist, and did so long ago<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Intreat for pity with so pure a zeal?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Suffice the world shall, for the world can say<br /></span> +<span class="i2">How much thy power hath power, and what it can;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Never was victor-hand yet moved to slay<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The rendered captive, or the yielding man.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then, O, why should thy woman-thought impose<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Death and disdain on him that yields his breath,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To free his soul from discontent and woes,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And humble sacrifice to a certain death?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">O since the world knows what the power can do,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">What were't for thee to save and love me too?<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>X</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">I meet not mine by others' discontent,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For none compares with me in true devotion;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet though my tears and sighs to her be spent,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her cruel heart disdains what they do motion.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet though persisting in eternal hate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To aggravate the cause of my complaining,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Her fury ne'er confineth with a date,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I will not cease to love, for her disdaining.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such puny thoughts of unresolvèd ground,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Whose inaudacity dares but base conceit,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In me and my love never shall be found.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Those coward thoughts unworthy minds await.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But those that love well have not yet begun;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Persèver ever and have never done!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span></p> + + +<h3>THE EIGHTH DECADE</h3> + +<h4>I</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Persèver ever and have never done,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">You weeping accent of my weary song!<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O do not you eternal passions shun,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But be you true and everlasting long!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Say that she doth requite you with disdain;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet fortified with hope, endure your fortune;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though cruel now she will be kind again;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Such haps as those, such loves as yours importune.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though she protests the faithfullest severity<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Inexecrable beauty is inflicting,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Kindness in time will pity your sincerity,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though now it be your fortune's interdicting.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For some can say, whose loves have known like passion,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">"Women are kind by kind, and coy for fashion."<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Give period to my matter of complaining,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Fair wonder of our time's admiring eye,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And entertain no more thy long disdaining,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or give me leave at last that I may die.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For who can live, perpetually secluded<br /></span> +<span class="i2">From death to life, that loathes her discontent?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lest by some hope seducively deluded,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Such thoughts aspire to fortunate event;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But I that now have drawn mal-pleasant breath<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Under the burden of thy cruel hate,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">O, I must long and linger after death,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And yet I dare not give my life her date;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For if I die and thou repent t' have slain me,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">'Twill grieve me more than if thou didst disdain me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">'Twill grieve me more than if thou didst disdain me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That I should die; and thou, because I die so.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And yet to die, it should not know to pain me,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">If cruel beauty were content to bid so.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Death to my life, life to my long despair<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Prolonged by her, given to my love and days,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Are means to tell how truly she is fair,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And I can die to testify her praise.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Yet not to die, though fairness me despiseth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Is cause why in complaint I thus persèver;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though death me and my love inparadiseth,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">By interdicting me from her for ever.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">I do not grieve that I am forced to die,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But die to think upon the reason why.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IV</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">My tears are true. Though others be divine,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sing of wars and Troy's new rising frame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Meeting heroic feet in every line,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That tread high measures in the scene of fame,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And I, though disaccustoming my muse,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And sing but low songs in an humble vein,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">May one day raise my style as others use,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And turn Elizon to a higher strain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">When re-intombing from oblivious ages<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In better stanzas her surviving wonder,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I may opposed against the monster rage<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That part desert and excellence asunder;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">That she though coy may yet survive to see,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Her beauty's wonder lives again in me.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>V</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Conclusion of the whole</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Sometimes in verse I praised, sometimes in verse sighed;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No more shall pen with love and beauty mell,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But to my heart alone my heart shall tell<br /></span> +<span class="i0">How unseen flames do burn it day and night,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lest flames give light, light bring my love to sight,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And my love prove my folly to excel.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wherefore my love burns like the fire of hell,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Wherein is fire and yet there is no light;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For if one never loved like me, then why<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Skill-less blames he the thing he doth not know?<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And he that so hath loved should favour show,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For he hath been a fool as well as I.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thus shall henceforth more pain, more folly have;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And folly past, may justly pardon crave.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>A CALCULATION UPON THE BIRTH OF AN HONOURABLE LADY'S DAUGHTER, BORN IN +THE YEAR 1588 AND ON A FRIDAY</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Fair by inheritance, whom born we see<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Both in the wondrous year and on the day<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Wherein the fairest planet beareth sway,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The heavens to thee this fortune doth decree!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thou of a world of hearts in time shall be<br /></span> +<span class="i2">A monarch great, and with one beauty's ray<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So many hosts of hearts thy face shall slay,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As all the rest for love shall yield to thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But even as Alexander when he knew<br /></span> +<span class="i2">His father's conquests wept, lest he should leave<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No kingdom unto him for to subdue:<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So shall thy mother thee of praise bereave;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">So many hearts already she hath slain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As few behind to conquer shall remain.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span></p> + + +<h3>SONNETS FROM THE MANUSCRIPT EDITION, NOT FOUND IN THAT OF 1594</h3> + +<h4>I</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the sudden surprising of his heart, and how unawares he was caught</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Delight in your bright eyes my death did breed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As light and glittering weapons babes allure<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To play with fire and sword, and so procure<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then to be burnt and hurt ere they take heed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy beauty so hath made me burn and bleed;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Yet shall my ashes and my blood assure<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy beauty's fame forever to endure;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For thy fame's life from my death doth proceed;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Because my heart to ashes burnèd giveth<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Life to thy fame, thou right a phœnix art,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And like a pelican thy beauty liveth<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By sucking blood out of my breast and heart.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lo why with wonder we may thee compare<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Unto the pelican and phœnix rare!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>II</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>An exhortation to the reader to come and see his mistress's beauty</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Eyes curious to behold what nature can create,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Come see, come see, and write what wonder you do see,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Causing by true report our next posterity<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Curse fortune for that they were born too late!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Come then and come ye all, come soon lest that<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The time should be too short and men too few should be;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For all be few to write her least part's history,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Though they should ever write and never write but that.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Millions look on her eyes, millions think on her wit,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Millions speak of her, millions write of her hand.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The whole eye on the lip I do not understand;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Millions too few to praise but some one part of it,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">As either of her eye or lip or hand to write,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The light or black, the taste or red, the soft or white.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>III</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the excellency of his lady's voice</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Lady of ladies, the delight alone<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For which to heaven earth doth no envy bear;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Seeing and hearing thee, we see and hear<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such voice, such light, as never sung nor shone.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The want of heaven I grant yet we may moan,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Not for the pleasure of the angels there,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">As though in face or voice they like thee were,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But that they many be, and thou but one.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The basest notes which from thy voice proceed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The treble of the angels do exceed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So that I fear their choir to beautify,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lest thou to some in heaven shall sing and shine.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lo, when I hear thee sing, the reason why<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Sighs of my breast keep time with notes of thine!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IV</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of her excellency both in singing and instruments</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Not that thy hand is soft, is sweet, is white,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy lips sweet roses, breast sweet lily is,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That love esteems these three the chiefest bliss<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which nature ever made for lips' delight;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when these three to show their heavenly might<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Such wonders do, devotion then for this<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Commandeth us with humble zeal to kiss<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Such things as work miracles in our sight.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">A lute of senseless wood, by nature dumb,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Touched by thy hand doth speak divinely well;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And from thy lips and breast sweet tunes do come<br /></span> +<span class="i4">To my dead heart, the which new life do give.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of greater wonders heard we never tell<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Than for the dumb to speak, the dead to live.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>V</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Of the envy others bear to his lady for the former perfections</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">When beauty to the world vouchsafes this bliss,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">To show the one whose other there is not,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The whitest skins red blushing shame doth blot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And in the reddest cheeks pale envy is.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fair and foul come thus alike by this;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For when the sun hath our horizon got,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Venus herself doth shine no more, God wot,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Than the least star that takes the light from his.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The poor in beauty thus content remain<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To see their jealous cause revenged in thee,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And their fair foes afflicted with like pain.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Lo, the clear proof of thy divinity;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For unto God is only due this praise<br /></span> +<span class="i2">The highest to pluck down, the low to raise!<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VI</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>To his mistress, upon occasion of a Petrarch he gave her, showing her +the reason why the Italian commenters dissent so much in the exposition +thereof</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Miracle of the world! I never will deny<br /></span> +<span class="i2">That former poets praise the beauty of their days;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But all those beauties were but figures of thy praise,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And all those poets did of thee but prophesy.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Thy coming to the world hath taught us to descry<br /></span> +<span class="i2">What Petrarch's Laura meant, for truth the lip bewrays.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lo, why th' Italians, yet which never saw thy rays,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">To find out Petrarch's sense such forgèd glosses try!<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The beauties which he in a veil enclosed beheld<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But revelations were within his surest heart<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By which in parables thy coming he foretold;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">His songs were hymns of thee, which only now before<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Thy image should be sung; for thou that goddess art<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Which only we without idolatry adore.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VII</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Complaint of misfortune in love only</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Now, now I love indeed, and suffer more<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In one day now then I did in a year;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Great flames they be which but small sparkles were,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And wounded now, I was but pricked before.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">No marvel then, though more than heretofore<br /></span> +<span class="i2">I weep and sigh; how can great wounds be there<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Where moisture runs not out? and ever, where<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The fire is great, of smoke there must be store.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">My heart was hitherto but like green wood,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which must be dried before it will burn bright;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">My former love served but my heart to dry;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Now Cupid for his fire doth find it good:<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For now it burneth clear, and shall give light<br /></span> +<span class="i4">For all the world your beauty to espy.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>VIII</h4> + +<p class="center"><i>Complaint of his lady's melancholiness</i></p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If that one care had our two hearts possessed,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Or you once (felt) what I long sufferèd,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then should thy heart accuse in my heart's stead<br /></span> +<span class="i0">The rigour of itself for mine unrest.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Then should thine arm upon my shoulder rest,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And weight of grief sway down thy troubled head;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Then should thy tears upon my sheet be shed,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And then thy heart should pant upon my breast.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But when that other cares thy heart do seize,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Alas, what succour gain I then by this,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">But double grief for thine and mine unease?<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Yet when thou see'st thy hurts to wound my heart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And so art taught by me what pity is,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Perhaps thy heart will learn to feel my smart.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>IX</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">Dear, though from me your gratious looks depart,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">And of that comfort do myself bereave,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Which both I did deserve and did receive,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Triumph not over much in this my smart.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Nay, rather they which now enjoy thy heart<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For fear just cause of mourning should conceive,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Lest thou inconstant shouldst their trust deceive<br /></span> +<span class="i0">Which like unto the weather changing art.<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For in foul weather birds sing often will<br /></span> +<span class="i2">In hope of fair, and in fair time will cease,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">For fear fair time should not continue still;<br /></span> +<span class="i4">So they may mourn which have thy heart possessed<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For fear of change, and hope of change may ease<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Their hearts whom grief of change doth now molest.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<p><span class='pagenum'><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span></p> + + +<h4>X</h4> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i0">If ever any justly might complain<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Of unrequited service, it is I;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Change is the thanks I have for loyalty,<br /></span> +<span class="i0">And only her reward is her disdain;<br /></span> +<span class="i0">So as just spite did almost me constrain,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Through torment her due praises to deny,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">For he which vexèd is with injury<br /></span> +<span class="i0">By speaking ill doth ease his heart of pain.<br /></span> +<span class="i2">But what, shall torture make me wrong her name?<br /></span> +<span class="i2">No, no, a pris'ner constant thinks it shame,<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though he (were) racked his first truth to gainsay.<br /></span> +<span class="i4">Her true given praise my first confession is;<br /></span> +<span class="i2">Though her disdain do rack me night and day,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">This I confessed, and will deny in this.<br /></span> +</div></div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h5>Printed by <span class="smcap">Ballantyne, Hanson & Co.</span> London & Edinburgh</h5> + + +<div class="footnotes"><h3>FOOTNOTES:</h3> + +<div class="footnote"><p><a name="Footnote_A_1" id="Footnote_A_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_A_1"><span class="label">[A]</span></a> Richard Smith was the publisher of the 1594 edition of the +<i>Diana</i>.</p></div> + +</div> + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Elizabethan Sonnet-Cycles, by +Samuel Daniel and Henry Constable + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ELIZABETHAN SONNET-CYCLES *** + +***** This file should be named 18842-h.htm or 18842-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/8/8/4/18842/ + +Produced by David Starner, Taavi Kalju and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Elizabethan Sonnet-Cycles + Delia - Diana + +Author: Samuel Daniel and Henry Constable + +Editor: Martha Foote Crow + +Release Date: July 16, 2006 [EBook #18842] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ELIZABETHAN SONNET-CYCLES *** + + + + +Produced by David Starner, Taavi Kalju and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + +ELIZABETHAN SONNET-CYCLES + +EDITED BY + +MARTHA FOOTE CROW + + +DELIA + +BY SAMUEL DANIEL + +DIANA + +BY HENRY CONSTABLE + + +KEGAN PAUL, TRENCH, TRUeBNER AND CO. +PATERNOSTER HOUSE LONDON W.C. + +1896 + + + + +DELIA + +BY + +SAMUEL DANIEL + + + + +SAMUEL DANIEL + + +Daniel's sonnet series has been by many regarded as the prototype of +Shakespeare's. It is true that several of Daniel's themes are repeated +in the cycle composed by the greater poet. The ideas of immortality in +verse, the transitoriness of beauty, the assurances of truth, the +humility and the woes of the lover, the pain of separation and the +comfort of night thoughts, shape the mood of both poets. But these +motives are also found in the pages of many other sonneteers of the +time. All these devotees seem to have had a storehouse of poetic +conceits which they held in common, and from which each poet had the +right to draw materials to use in his own way. In fact Shakespeare's +sonnets are full of echoes from the voices of Sidney, Constable, Davies, +Lodge, Watson, Drayton and Barnes, as well as from that mellifluous one +of Daniel; and these poetic conceits were tossed forth in the first +place by the Italian sonnet makers, led by Petrarch. It is evident that +Daniel's _Petrarch_ has been well-thumbed. Wood says that Daniel left +Oxford without a degree because "his geny" was "more prone to easier and +smoother studies than in pecking and hewing at logic," and we may +believe that Italian was one of these smoother studies. His translation +of Paolo Giovi's work on Emblems, which was published in 1585, was +doubtless one fruit of this study, a work that since it took him into +the very realm of the _concetti_, was to be a potent influence upon his +mental growth. The main theme, the cruelty of the Fair, is the same as +that of Petrarch. Daniel follows this master in making the vale echo +with his sighs, in appealing to her hand and cruel bosom for mercy, in +recounting the number of years he has worshipped her and honored her +with sonnets on which he is depending for immortal fame, in upbraiding +her for her devotion to the mirror rather than to him, and for ensnaring +him with the golden net of her hair and transpiercing him with the +darts from her crystalline eyes. In some of Petrarch's nobler flights +Daniel does not follow; the higher teachings of love are not revealed to +him, the step from human to divine he does not take; yet in the main, +the features of the earlier poet re-appear in Daniel's verse, as they do +in most of his fellow-sonneteers, including Shakespeare. + +It is also not best to give too much weight to the opinion that +Shakespeare has been over-influenced by Daniel in the adoption of the +quatrain and couplet structure. The whole period from Wyatt to +Shakespeare shows a slow and steady mastery of the native over the +foreign tendency. The change was not a sudden leap on the part of Daniel +and Shakespeare, but a gradual growth occupying a half century and +culminating in the English form. But if we should feel convinced that +Shakespeare's memory was influenced by the sound of Daniel's cadences, +this need not be considered discreditable to Shakespeare. Daniel's lines +are smooth and melodious, and he was perhaps as great a master of the +technique of rhyme as was Shakespeare. If we take the sonnets of both +poets as criterion, the careful Daniel uses twice as many rhyme colours +as Shakespeare, while Shakespeare repeats rhymes twice as often as +Daniel. If double rhymes find less favor with the captious, we admit +that Daniel has a third more than Shakespeare has, but again Shakespeare +uses twice as many rhymes on syllables with secondary stress as does +Daniel, and Shakespeare's bad rhymes are as bad as Daniel's and more +frequent. + +Daniel's poetic powers were appreciated to the full in his time. To his +contemporaries he was the "well languaged," the "sharp conceited," one +by whose verse Rosamond was eternised, one who "divinely sonnetted his +Delia." When Judicio in _The Return from Parnassus_ makes his inventory +of poet's qualities, in giving his judgment on Daniel, he evidently has +the _Delia_ in mind. + + "Sweet honey-dropping Daniel doth wage + War with the proudest big Italian + That melts his heart in sugared sonnetting." + +If Jonson, Daniel's rival as maker of masques for the Court, proclaimed +him a good honest man but no poet, Spenser generously said he surpassed +"all that afore him came;" and scarcely one of the more prominent of his +contemporaries failed to address compliments to him. When Daniel was +gentleman extraordinary and groom of the privy chamber to Anne, +Queen-consort to James I., the Queen is said to have been a "favourer +and encourager of his muse;" and his high social position made it easy +for less favoured aspirants to praise him. But the perspective of time +brings a more balanced judgment. While Lowell finds in the fact that +Daniel was held in high esteem by his contemporaries a proof that noble +diction was appreciated then as now, and while he admits that Daniel +refined our tongue, yet he decided that Daniel had the thinking and +languaging parts of a poet's outfit but lacked the higher creative gift. +We shall find Daniel at his best, not when in prosaic soberness he sings + + "... the civil wars, tumultuous broils, + And bloody factions of a mighty land." + +not when he is framing stilted tragedies with chorus and declamation in +the grand Senecan manner, not in his complimentary addresses to lords, +ladies and royalty, nor in the classic masques and philosophical +dialogue, but in the less ambitious poems of _Delia_ and _Rosamond_, +especially in such a sonnet as "Care-charmer Sleep," where we come more +near to hearing a human heart beat than in any of the others. It is not +a mighty heart, but it is one that is gentle, tender and pure. + +A glance at the life of Daniel gives opportunity for an easy conjecture +as to the personality of the lady honoured under the name of Delia. At +seventeen Daniel was at Oxford, and finished a three years' residence at +Magdalen College in 1582. After a visit to Italy, he became established +at Wilton as tutor to the sons of Mary Sidney, Countess of Pembroke. To +those early days at Wilton the poet refers, when in 1603 he dedicates +his _Defense of Rhyme_ to William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, his former +pupil. In the introduction to this fine essay Daniel declares that in +regard to his poetic studies he was "first encouraged and framed +thereunto by your most worthy and honourable mother, and received the +first notion for the formal ordering of those compositions at Wilton +which I must ever acknowledge as my best school, and thereof always am +to hold a feeling and grateful memory." At this time the home of the +Herberts at Wilton was a literary centre. The Countess was herself an +industrious author, and the subject of innumerable dedicatory addresses. +She seems to have been as beautiful as she was gracious and gifted. In +the Penshurst picture we see her in extreme youth. The long oval and +delicate chiselling of the Sidney face are expressed in their finest +perfection, and justify the resemblance, found by Spenser, to "her +brother dear." The soft hair is of the same golden-brown as his, the +colour her eldest son inherited, and which Shakespeare is said to have +described in his figure of the marjoram-buds. In the picture by +Gheeraedts at the National Portrait Gallery, painted in 1614, she has +lost little of her youthful beauty, but has added the special graces of +maturity. The hair is still a rich brown. A thoughtful soul sits +brooding behind those attentive eyes--a soul that seems to wish to ask +the universal unanswerable questions, one that has grappled with doubt +and struggled with environing circumstance, but has not yet consented to +be baffled. The face is modern and complex. This accomplished lady +received at Wilton the most distinguished people of her time. Her guests +included Spenser, Raleigh, probably Shakespeare, Ben Jonson, Inigo +Jones, Sir John Harrington, Dr. Donne, and many more; and the Countess's +_Pastoral Dialogue in Praise of Astraea_ was probably written in honour +of a visit from the Queen herself. It would perhaps be strange if the +young poet did not surround the personality of this fascinating +patroness with a romantic halo and feel that his poetic fame was linked +with hers. The Delia of the sonnets has all the excellencies that a +sonnet-honoured lady should have, including locks of gold. But the fact +that the poet has slyly changed the word "amber" to "snary" in sonnet +xiv., and "golden" to "sable" in sonnet xxxviii., looks as if he desired +to shield her personality from too blunt a guess. However, many hints +are given; she lives in the "joyful North," in "fair Albion;" she is + + "The eternal wonder of our happy Isle." + +And the river by which he sounds her name is the Avon-- + + "But Avon, poor in fame and poor in waters, + Shall have my song, where Delia hath her seat." + +The Wiltshire Avon is the proud brook that flows southward by Wilton, +"where Delia hath her seat." If it may seem in any degree unfitting that +Daniel should address language so glowing as is found in the _Delia_ +sonnets to a lady who is established as the head of a household with +husband and sons about her, attention may be called to the fact that the +sonnets, though they are characterised by warmth of feeling and +extravagance of expression, do not contain one tainted line. Posterity +must justify what Daniel in proud humility said of himself: + + "I . . . . . . . + . . . never had my harmless pen at all + Distained with any loose immodesty, + But still have done the fairest offices + To virtue and the time." + +The respectful dignity of Daniel's prose dedication of _Delia_ to Mary +Sidney cannot be surpassed; and the introductory sonnet that displaces +it in the next edition, while confessing the ardent devotion of the +writer, is yet couched in the most reverent terms. Daniel and other +sonneteers had the great example of Petrarch in honouring a lady with +admiration and love expressed in verses whose warmth might perhaps not +have been so excusable, could the poet have been taken at his word. The +new sonnets inserted in the editions of 1601 and 1623 show the +faithfulness of the poet's homage. A loyal friendship, whether formed +upon gratitude only or upon some warmer feeling, inspired the _Delia_ +although the poet expresses his devotion in the conventional modes. But +that Daniel outgrew to some extent the taste for these fanciful devices +is shown by the changes he made in successive editions. Four sonnets +from the 1591 edition were never reprinted, another was reprinted once +and afterwards omitted. In our text the order of the 1623 edition is +followed, the edition that was supervised by the poet's brother; but +these omitted sonnets will be found at the end under the head of +_Rejected Sonnets_. It is certain that they are Daniel's and that he +rejected them, and it therefore seems no more than fair to the poet, if +they are reprinted at all, to insert them under this head. + +While, then, these rejected sonnets may have been in two cases omitted +by the poet because of their too great frankness of expression, in other +cases, notably in the phoenix, the wax-image, the tablet-and-siren, the +vanquished fort, and the ermelin sonnets, they seem to have lost their +charm, not so much for any personal reason as for the artistic defect in +the far-fetched nature of the device. + +Daniel lived till 1619, experiencing the usual ups and downs in the +career of a "Court-dear poet." In later years, the famous Lady Anne +Clifford, wife of Mary Sidney's younger son, caused a monument to be +erected in his honour, in the inscription upon which she recorded her +pride in the fact that he had once been her tutor. + + + + +TO THE RIGHT HONOURABLE + +THE LADY MARY + +COUNTESS OF PEMBROKE + + + Wonder of these, glory of other times, + O thou whom envy ev'n is forced t'admire! + Great Patroness of these my humble rhymes, + Which thou from out thy greatness dost inspire! + Since only thou has deigned to raise them higher, + Vouchsafe now to accept them as thine own, + Begotten by thy hand and my desire, + Wherein my zeal and thy great might is shown. + And seeing this unto the world is known, + O leave not still to grace thy work in me; + Let not the quickening seed be overthrown + Of that which may be born to honor thee, + Whereof the travail I may challenge mine, + But yet the glory, Madam, must be thine! + + +TO DELIA + +I + + Unto the boundless ocean of thy beauty + Runs this poor river, charged with streams of zeal, + Returning thee the tribute of my duty, + Which here my love, my youth, my plaints reveal. + Here I unclasp the book of my charged soul, + Where I have cast th' accounts of all my care; + Here have I summed my sighs. Here I enrol + How they were spent for thee. Look, what they are. + Look on the dear expenses of my youth, + And see how just I reckon with thine eyes. + Examine well thy beauty with my truth, + And cross my cares ere greater sums arise. + Read it, sweet maid, though it be done but slightly; + Who can show all his love, doth love but lightly. + + +II + + Go, wailing verse, the infants of my love, + Minerva-like, brought forth without a mother; + Present the image of the cares I prove, + Witness your father's grief exceeds all other. + Sigh out a story of her cruel deeds, + With interrupted accents of despair; + A monument that whosoever reads, + May justly praise and blame my loveless Fair; + Say her disdain hath dried up my blood, + And starved you, in succours still denying; + Press to her eyes, importune me some good, + Waken her sleeping pity with your crying: + Knock at her hard heart, beg till you have moved her, + And tell th'unkind how dearly I have loved her. + + +III + + If so it hap this offspring of my care, + These fatal anthems, lamentable songs, + Come to their view, who like afflicted are; + Let them yet sigh their own, and moan my wrongs. + But untouched hearts with unaffected eye, + Approach not to behold my soul's distress; + Clear-sighted you soon note what is awry, + Whilst blinded souls mine errors never guess. + You blinded souls, whom youth and error lead; + You outcast eaglets dazzled with your sun, + Do you, and none but you, my sorrows read; + You best can judge the wrongs that she hath done, + That she hath done, the motive of my pain, + Who whilst I love doth kill me with disdain. + + +IV + + These plaintive verse, the posts of my desire, + Which haste for succour to her slow regard, + Bear not report of any slender fire, + Forging a grief to win a fame's reward. + Nor are my passions limned for outward hue, + For that no colours can depaint my sorrows; + Delia herself, and all the world may view + Best in my face where cares have tilled deep furrows. + No bays I seek to deck my mourning brow, + O clear-eyed rector of the holy hill! + My humble accents bear the olive bough + Of intercession but to move her will. + These lines I use t'unburden mine own heart; + My love affects no fame nor 'steems of art. + + +V + + Whilst youth and error led my wandering mind, + And set my thoughts in heedless ways to range, + All unawares a goddess chaste I find, + Diana-like, to work my sudden change. + For her, no sooner had mine eye bewrayed, + But with disdain to see me in that place, + With fairest hand the sweet unkindest maid + Casts water-cold disdain upon my face. + Which turned my sport into a hart's despair, + Which still is chased, while I have any breath, + By mine own thoughts set on me by my Fair. + My thoughts like hounds pursue me to my death; + Those that I fostered of mine own accord, + Are made by her to murder thus their lord. + + +VI + + Fair is my love, and cruel as she's fair; + Her brow shades frowns although her eyes are sunny; + Her smiles are lightning though her pride despair; + And her disdains are gall, her favours honey; + A modest maid, decked with a blush of honour, + Whose feet do tread green paths of youth and love; + The wonder of all eyes that look upon her, + Sacred on earth, designed a saint above. + Chastity and beauty, which were deadly foes, + Live reconciled friends within her brow; + And had she pity to conjoin with those, + Then who had heard the plaints I utter now? + O had she not been fair and thus unkind, + My Muse had slept and none had known my mind! + + +VII + + For had she not been fair and thus unkind, + Then had no finger pointed at my lightness; + The world had never known what I do find, + And clouds obscure had shaded still her brightness. + Then had no censor's eye these lines surveyed, + Nor graver brows have judged my Muse so vain; + No sun my blush and error had bewrayed, + Nor yet the world had heard of such disdain. + Then had I walked with bold erected face; + No downcast look had signified my miss; + But my degraded hopes with such disgrace + Did force me groan out griefs and utter this. + For being full, should I not then have spoken, + My sense oppressed had failed and heart had broken. + + +VIII + + Thou, poor heart, sacrificed unto the fairest, + Hast sent the incense of thy sighs to heaven; + And still against her frowns fresh vows repairest, + And made thy passions with her beauty even. + And you, mine eyes, the agents of my heart, + Told the dumb message of my hidden grief; + And oft, with careful tunes, with silent art, + Did treat the cruel Fair to yield relief. + And you, my verse, the advocates of love, + Have followed hard the process of my case: + And urged that title which doth plainly prove + My faith should win, if justice might have place. + Yet though I see that nought we do can move, + 'Tis not disdain must make me cease to love. + + +IX + + If this be love, to draw a weary breath, + To paint on floods till the shore cry to th'air; + With downward looks still reading on the earth. + These sad memorials of my love's despair; + If this be love, to war against my soul, + Lie down to wail, rise up to sigh and grieve, + The never-resting stone of care to roll, + Still to complain my griefs, whilst none relieve; + If this be love, to clothe me with dark thoughts, + Haunting untrodden paths to wail apart, + My pleasures horror, music tragic notes, + Tears in mine eyes and sorrow at my heart; + If this be love, to live a living death, + Then do I love, and draw this weary breath. + + +X + + Then do I love and draw this weary breath + For her, the cruel Fair, within whose brow + I written find the sentence of my death + In unkind letters wrote she cares not how. + Thou power that rul'st the confines of the night, + Laughter-loving goddess, worldly pleasures' queen, + Intenerate that heart that sets so light + The truest love that ever yet was seen; + And cause her leave to triumph in this wise + Upon the prostrate spoil of that poor heart + That serves, a trophy to her conquering eyes, + And must their glory to the world impart; + Once let her know sh'hath done enough to prove me, + And let her pity if she cannot love me! + + +XI + + Tears, vows and prayers gain the hardest hearts, + Tears, vows and prayers have I spent in vain; + Tears cannot soften flint nor vows convert; + Prayers prevail not with a quaint disdain. + I lose my tears where I have lost my love, + I vow my faith where faith is not regarded, + I pray in vain a merciless to move; + So rare a faith ought better be rewarded. + Yet though I cannot win her will with tears, + Though my soul's idol scorneth all my vows, + Though all my prayers be to so deaf ears, + No favour though the cruel Fair allows, + Yet will I weep, vow, pray to cruel she; + Flint, frost, disdain, wears, melts and yields, we see. + + +XII + + My spotless love hovers with purest wings + About the temple of the proudest frame, + Where blaze those lights, fairest of earthly things; + Which clear our clouded world with brightest flame. + M'ambitious thoughts, confined in her face, + Affect no honour but what she can give; + My hopes do rest in limits of her grace; + I weigh no comfort unless she relieve. + For she that can my heart imparadise, + Holds in her fairest hand what dearest is. + My fortune's wheel's the circle of her eyes, + Whose rolling grace deign once a turn of bliss. + All my life's sweet consists in her alone, + So much I love the most unloving one. + + +XIII + + Behold what hap Pygmalion had to frame + And carve his proper grief upon a stone! + My heavy fortune is much like the same; + I work on flint and that's the cause I moan. + For hapless lo, even with mine own desires + I figured on the table of my heart + The fairest form that the world's eye admires, + And so did perish by my proper art. + And still I toil to change the marble breast + Of her whose sweetest grace I do adore, + Yet cannot find her breathe unto my rest. + Hard is her heart, and woe is me therefore. + O happy he that joyed his stone and art! + Unhappy I, to love a stony heart! + + +XIV + + Those snary locks are those same nets, my dear, + Wherewith my liberty thou didst surprise + Love was the flame that fired me so near, + The dart transpiercing were those crystal eyes. + Strong is the net, and fervent is the flame; + Deep is the wound my sighs can well report. + Yet I do love, adore, and praise the same, + That holds, that burns, that wounds in this sort; + And list not seek to break, to quench, to heal, + The bond, the flame, the wound that festereth so, + By knife, by liquor, or by salve to deal; + So much I please to perish in my woe. + Yet lest long travails be above my strength, + Good Delia, loose, quench, heal me, now at length! + + +XV + + If that a loyal heart and faith unfeigned, + If a sweet languish with a chaste desire, + If hunger-starven thoughts so long retained, + Fed but with smoke, and cherished but with fire; + And if a brow with care's characters painted + Bewray my love with broken words half spoken + To her which sits in my thoughts' temple sainted, + And lays to view my vulture-gnawn heart open; + If I have done due homage to her eyes, + And had my sighs still tending on her name, + If on her love my life and honour lies, + And she, th'unkindest maid, still scorns the same; + Let this suffice, that all the world may see + The fault is hers, though mine the hurt must be. + + +XVI + + Happy in sleep, waking content to languish, + Embracing clouds by night, in daytime mourn, + My joys but shadows, touch of truth my anguish, + Griefs ever springing, comforts never born; + And still expecting when she will relent, + Grown hoarse with crying, "mercy, mercy give," + So many vows and prayers having spent + That weary of my life I loathe to live; + And yet the hydra of my cares renews + Still new-born sorrows of her fresh disdain; + And still my hope the summer winds pursues, + Finding no end nor period of my pain; + This is my state, my griefs do touch so nearly, + And thus I live because I love her dearly. + + +XVII + + Why should I sing in verse? Why should I frame + These sad neglected notes for her dear sake? + Why should I offer up unto her name, + The sweetest sacrifice my youth can make? + Why should I strive to make her live for ever, + That never deigns to give me joy to live? + Why should m'afflicted Muse so much endeavour + Such honour unto cruelty to give? + If her defects have purchased her this fame, + What should her virtues do, her smiles, her love? + If this her worst, how should her best inflame? + What passions would her milder favours move? + Favours, I think, would sense quite overcome; + And that makes happy lovers ever dumb. + + +XVIII + + Since the first look that led me to this error, + To this thoughts' maze to my confusion tending, + Still have I lived in grief, in hope, in terror, + The circle of my sorrows never ending; + Yet cannot leave her love that holds me hateful; + Her eyes exact it, though her heart disdains me. + See what reward he hath that serves th'ungrateful? + So true and loyal love no favour gains me. + Still must I whet my young desires abated, + Upon the flint of such a heart rebelling; + And all in vain; her pride is so innated, + She yields no place at all for pity's dwelling. + Oft have I told her that my soul did love her, + And that with tears; yet all this will not move her. + + +XIX + + Restore thy tresses to the golden ore, + Yield Cytherea's son those arks of love; + Bequeath the heavens the stars that I adore, + And to the orient do thy pearls remove; + Yield thy hands' pride unto the ivory white; + T'Arabian odours give thy breathing sweet; + Restore thy blush unto Aurora bright; + To Thetis give the honour of thy feet. + Let Venus have the graces she resigned, + And thy sweet voice give back unto the spheres; + But yet restore thy fierce and cruel mind + To Hyrcan tigers and to ruthless bears; + Yield to the marble thy hard heart again; + So shalt thou cease to plague, and I to pain. + + +XX + + What it is to breathe and live without life; + How to be pale with anguish, red with fear, + T'have peace abroad, and nought within but strife: + Wish to be present, and yet shun t'appear; + How to be bold far off, and bashful near; + How to think much, and have no words to speak; + To crave redress, yet hold affliction dear; + To have affection strong, a body weak, + Never to find, yet evermore to seek; + And seek that which I dare not hope to find; + T'affect this life and yet this life disleek, + Grateful t'another, to myself unkind: + This cruel knowledge of these contraries, + Delia, my heart hath learned out of those eyes. + + +XXI + + If beauty thus be clouded with a frown, + That pity shines no comfort to my bliss, + And vapours of disdain so overgrown, + That my life's light wholly indarkened is, + Why should I more molest the world with cries, + The air with sighs, the earth below with tears, + Since I live hateful to those ruthful eyes, + Vexing with untuned moan her dainty ears! + If I have loved her dearer than my breath, + My breath that calls the heaven to witness it!-- + And still hold her most dear until my death, + And if that all this cannot move one whit, + Yet sure she cannot but must think apart + She doth me wrong to grieve so true a heart. + + +XXII + + Come Time, the anchor hold of my desire, + My last resort whereto my hopes appeal; + Cause once the date of her disdain t'exspire, + Make her the sentence of her wrath repeal. + Rob her fair brow, break in on beauty, steal + Power from those eyes which pity cannot spare; + Deal with those dainty cheeks, as she doth deal + With this poor heart consumed with despair. + This heart made now the prospective of care + By loving her, the cruelst fair that lives, + The cruelst fair that sees I pine for her, + And never mercy to thy merit gives. + Let her not still triumph over the prize + Of mine affections taken by her eyes. + + +XXIII + + Time, cruel Time, come and subdue that brow + Which conquers all but thee, and thee too stays, + As if she were exempt from scythe or bow, + From love or years unsubject to decays. + Or art thou grown in league with those fair eyes, + That they may help thee to consume our days? + Or dost thou spare her for her cruelties, + Being merciless like thee that no man weighs? + And yet thou seest thy power she disobeys, + Cares not for thee, but lets thee waste in vain, + And prodigal of hours and years betrays + Beauty and youth t'opinion and disdain. + Yet spare her, Time; let her exempted be; + She may become more kind to thee or me. + + +XXIV + + These sorrowing sighs, the smoke of mine annoy, + These tears, which heat of sacred flame distils, + Are those due tributes that my faith doth pay + Unto the tyrant whose unkindness kills. + I sacrifice my youth and blooming years + At her proud feet, and she respects not it; + My flower, untimely's withered with my tears, + By winter woes for spring of youth unfit. + She thinks a look may recompense my care, + And so with looks prolongs my long-looked ease; + As short that bliss, so is the comfort rare; + Yet must that bliss my hungry thoughts appease. + Thus she returns my hopes so fruitless ever; + Once let her love indeed, or eye me never! + + +XXV + + False hope prolongs my ever certain grief, + Traitor to me, and faithful to my love. + A thousand times it promised me relief, + Yet never any true effect I prove. + Oft when I find in her no truth at all, + I banish her, and blame her treachery; + Yet soon again I must her back recall, + As one that dies without her company. + Thus often, as I chase my hope from me, + Straightway she hastes her unto Delia's eyes; + Fed with some pleasing look, there shall she be, + And so sent back. And thus my fortune lies; + Looks feed my hope, hope fosters me in vain; + Hopes are unsure when certain is my pain. + + +XXVI + + Look in my griefs, and blame me not to mourn, + From care to care that leads a life so bad; + Th'orphan of fortune, born to be her scorn, + Whose clouded brow doth make my days so sad. + Long are their nights whose cares do never sleep, + Loathsome their days who never sun yet joyed; + The impression of her eyes do pierce so deep, + That thus I live both day and night annoyed. + Yet since the sweetest root yields fruit so sour, + Her praise from my complaint I may not part; + I love th'effect, the cause being of this power; + I'll praise her face and blame her flinty heart, + Whilst we both make the world admire at us, + Her for disdain, and me for loving thus. + + +XXVII + + Reignin my thoughts, fair hand, sweet eye, rare voice! + Possess me whole, my heart's triumvirate! + Yet heavy heart, to make so hard a choice + Of such as spoil thy poor afflicted state! + For whilst they strive which shall be lord of all, + All my poor life by them is trodden down; + They all erect their trophies on my fall, + And yield me nought that gives them their renown. + When back I look, I sigh my freedom past, + And wail the state wherein I present stand, + And see my fortune ever like to last, + Finding me reined with such a heavy hand. + What can I do but yield? and yield I do; + And serve all three, and yet they spoil me too! + + +XXVIII + +_Alluding to the sparrow pursued by a hawk, that flew into the bosom of +Zenocrates_ + + Whilst by thy eyes pursued, my poor heart flew + Into the sacred refuge of thy breast; + Thy rigour in that sanctuary slew + That which thy succ'ring mercy should have blest. + No privilege of faith could it protect, + Faith being with blood and five years witness signed, + Wherein no show gave cause of least suspect, + For well thou saw'st my love and how I pined. + Yet no mild comfort would thy brow reveal, + No lightning looks which falling hopes erect; + What boots to laws of succour to appeal? + Ladies and tyrants never laws respect. + Then there I die from whence my life should come, + And by that hand whom such deeds ill become. + + +XXIX + + Still in the trace of one perplexed thought, + My ceaseless cares continually run on, + Seeking in vain what I have ever sought, + One in my love, and her hard heart still one. + I who did never joy in other sun, + And have no stars but those that must fulfil + The work of rigour, fatally begun + Upon this heart whom cruelty will kill, + Injurious Delia!--yet, I love thee still, + And will whilst I shall draw this breath of mine; + I'll tell the world that I deserved but ill, + And blame myself, t'excuse that heart of thine; + See then who sins the greater of us twain, + I in my love, or thou in thy disdain. + + +XXX + + Oft do I marvel whether Delia's eyes + Are eyes, or else two radiant stars that shine; + For how could nature ever thus devise + Of earth, on earth, a substance so divine? + Stars, sure, they are, whose motions rule desires, + And calm and tempest follow their aspects; + Their sweet appearing still such power inspires, + That makes the world admire so strange effects. + Yet whether fixed or wandering stars are they, + Whose influence rules the orb of my poor heart; + Fixed, sure, they are, but wandering make me stray + In endless errors whence I cannot part. + Stars, then, not eyes, move you with milder view + Your sweet aspect on him that honours you! + + +XXXI + + The star of my mishap imposed this pain + To spend the April of my years in grief; + Finding my fortune ever in the wane, + With still fresh cares, supplied with no relief. + Yet thee I blame not, though for thee 'tis done; + But these weak wings presuming to aspire, + Which now are melted by thine eyes' bright sun + That makes me fall from off my high desire; + And in my fall I cry for help with speed, + No pitying eye looks back upon my fears; + No succour find I now when most I need: + My heats must drown in th'ocean of my tears, + Which still must bear the title of my wrong, + Caused by those cruel beams that were so strong. + + +XXXII + + And yet I cannot reprehend the flight, + Or blame th'attempt, presuming so to soar; + The mounting venture for a high delight + Did make the honour of the fall the more. + For who gets wealth, that puts not from the shore? + Danger hath honours, great designs their fame, + Glory doth follow, courage goes before; + And though th'event oft answers not the same, + Suffice that high attempts have never shame. + The mean observer whom base safety keeps, + Lives without honour, dies without a name, + And in eternal darkness ever sleeps. + And therefore, Delia, 'tis to me no blot + To have attempted though attained thee not. + + +XXXIII + + Raising my hopes on hills of high desire, + Thinking to scale the heaven of her heart, + My slender means presumed too high a part, + Her thunder of disdain forced me retire, + And threw me down to pain in all this fire, + Where lo, I languish in so heavy smart + Because th'attempt was far above my art; + Her pride brooked not poor souls should come so nigh her. + Yet, I protest, my high desiring will + Was not to dispossess her of her right; + Her sovereignty should have remained still; + I only sought the bliss to have her sight. + Her sight, contented thus to see me spill, + Framed my desires fit for her eyes to kill. + + +XXXIV + + Why dost thou, Delia, credit so thy glass, + Gazing thy beauty deigned thee by the skies, + And dost not rather look on him, alas! + Whose state best shows the force of murdering eyes? + The broken tops of lofty trees declare + The fury of a mercy-wanting storm; + And of what force thy wounding graces are + Upon myself, you best may find the form. + Then leave thy glass, and gaze thyself on me; + That mirror shows what power is in thy face; + To view your form too much may danger be, + Narcissus changed t'a flower in such a case. + And you are changed, but not t'a hyacinth; + I fear your eye hath turned your heart to flint. + + +XXXV + + I once may see when years shall wreck my wrong, + And golden hairs shall change to silver wire, + And those bright rays that kindle all this fire, + Shall fail in force, their working not so strong, + Then beauty, now the burden of my song, + Whose glorious blaze the world doth so admire, + Must yield up all to tyrant Time's desire; + Then fade those flowers that decked her pride so long. + When if she grieve to gaze her in her glass, + Which then presents her whiter-withered hue, + Go you, my verse, go tell her what she was, + For what she was, she best shall find in you. + Your fiery heat lets not her glory pass, + But phoenix-like shall make her live anew. + + +XXXVI + + Look, Delia, how w'esteem the half-blown rose, + The image of thy blush, and summer's honour, + Whilst yet her tender bud doth undisclose + That full of beauty time bestows upon her. + No sooner spreads her glory in the air, + But straight her wide-blown pomp comes to decline; + She then is scorned that late adorned the fair; + So fade the roses of those cheeks of thine. + No April can revive thy withered flowers, + Whose springing grace adorns thy glory now; + Swift speedy time, feathered with flying hours, + Dissolves the beauty of the fairest brow. + Then do not thou such treasure waste in vain, + But love now whilst thou mayst be loved again. + + +XXXVII + + But love whilst that thou mayst be loved again, + Now whilst thy May hath filled thy lap with flowers, + Now whilst thy beauty bears without a stain, + Now use thy summer smiles, ere winter lowers. + And whilst thou spread'st unto the rising sun, + The fairest flower that ever saw the light, + Now joy thy time before thy sweet be done; + And, Delia, think thy morning must have night, + And that thy brightness sets at length to west, + When thou wilt close up that which now thou showest, + And think the same becomes thy fading best, + Which then shall most inveil and shadow most. + Men do not weigh the stalk for that it was, + When once they find her flower, her glory pass. + + +XXXVIII + + When men shall find thy flower, thy glory pass, + And thou with careful brow sitting alone + Received hast this message from thy glass + That tells the truth, and says that all is gone; + Fresh shalt thou see in me the wounds thou mad'st, + Though spent thy flame, in me the heat remaining. + I that have loved thee thus before thou fad'st, + My faith shall wax when thou art in thy waning. + The world shall find this miracle in me, + That fire can burn when all the matter's spent; + Then what my faith hath been thyself shalt see, + And that thou wast unkind thou mayst repent. + Thou mayst repent that thou hast scorned my tears, + When winter snows upon thy sable hairs. + + +XXXIX + + When winter snows upon thy sable hairs, + And frost of age hath nipped thy beauties near, + When dark shall seem thy day that never clears, + And all lies withered that was held so dear; + Then take this picture which I here present thee, + Limned with a pencil not all unworthy; + Here see the gifts that God and nature lent thee, + Here read thyself and what I suffered for thee. + This may remain thy lasting monument, + Which happily posterity may cherish; + These colours with thy fading are not spent, + These may remain when thou and I shall perish. + If they remain, then thou shalt live thereby; + They will remain, and so thou canst not die. + + +XL + + Thou canst not die whilst any zeal abound + In feeling hearts than can conceive these lines; + Though thou a Laura hast no Petrarch found, + In base attire yet clearly beauty shines. + And I though born within a colder clime, + Do feel mine inward heat as great--I know it; + He never had more faith, although more rhyme; + I love as well though he could better show it. + But I may add one feather to thy fame, + To help her flight throughout the fairest isle; + And if my pen could more enlarge thy name, + Then shouldst thou live in an immortal style. + For though that Laura better limned be, + Suffice, thou shalt be loved as well as she! + + +XLI + + Be not displeased that these my papers should + Bewray unto the world how fair thou art; + Or that my wits have showed the best they could + The chastest flame that ever warmed heart. + Think not, sweet Delia, this shall be thy shame, + My muse should sound thy praise with mournful warble. + How many live, the glory of whose name + Shall rest in ice, while thine is graved in marble! + Thou mayst in after ages live esteemed, + Unburied in these lines, reserved in pureness; + These shall entomb those eyes, that have redeemed + Me from the vulgar, thee from all obscureness. + Although my careful accents never moved thee, + Yet count it no disgrace that I loved thee. + + +XLII + + Delia, these eyes that so admireth thine, + Have seen those walls which proud ambition reared + To check the world, how they entombed have lain + Within themselves, and on them ploughs have eared; + Yet never found that barbarous hand attained + The spoil of fame deserved by virtuous men, + Whose glorious actions luckily had gained + Th'eternal annals of a happy pen. + And therefore grieve not if thy beauties die + Though time do spoil thee of the fairest veil + That ever yet covered mortality, + And must instar the needle and the rail. + That grace which doth more than inwoman thee, + Lives in my lines and must eternal be. + + +XLIII + + Most fair and lovely maid, look from the shore, + See thy Leander striving in these waves, + Poor soul quite spent, whose force can do no more. + Now send forth hope, for now calm pity saves, + And waft him to thee with those lovely eyes, + A happy convoy to a holy land. + Now show thy power, and where thy virtue lies; + To save thine own, stretch out the fairest hand. + Stretch out the fairest hand, a pledge of peace, + That hand that darts so right and never misses; + I shall forget old wrongs, my griefs shall cease; + And that which gave me wounds, I'll give it kisses. + Once let the ocean of my care find shore, + That thou be pleased, and I may sigh no more. + + +XLIV + + Read in my face a volume of despairs, + The wailing Iliads of my tragic woe; + Drawn with my blood, and painted with my cares, + Wrought by her hand that I have honoured so. + Who whilst I burn, she sings at my soul's wrack, + Looking aloft from turret of her pride; + There my soul's tyrant joys her in the sack + Of her own seat, whereof I made her guide. + There do these smokes that from affliction rise, + Serve as an incense to a cruel dame; + A sacrifice thrice-grateful to her eyes, + Because their power serves to exact the same. + Thus ruins she to satisfy her will, + The temple where her name was honoured still. + + +XLV + + My Delia hath the waters of mine eyes, + The ready handmaids on her grace t'attend, + That never fail to ebb, but ever rise; + For to their flow she never grants an end. + The ocean never did attend more duly + Upon his sovereign's course, the night's pale queen, + Nor paid the impost of his waves more truly, + Than mine unto her cruelty hath been. + Yet nought the rock of that hard heart can move, + Where beat these tears with zeal, and fury drives; + And yet, I'd rather languish in her love, + Than I would joy the fairest she that lives. + And if I find such pleasure to complain, + What should I do then if I should obtain? + + +XLVI + + How long shall I in mine affliction mourn, + A burden to myself, distressed in mind; + When shall my interdicted hopes return + From out despair wherein they live confined? + When shall her troubled brow charged with disdain + Reveal the treasure which her smiles impart? + When shall my faith the happiness attain, + To break the ice that hath congealed her heart? + Unto herself, herself my love doth summon, + (If love in her hath any power to move) + And let her tell me, as she is a woman, + Whether my faith hath not deserved her love? + I know her heart cannot but judge with me, + Although her eyes my adversaries be. + + +XLVII + + Beauty, sweet love, is like the morning dew, + Whose short refresh upon the tender green + Cheers for a time but till the sun doth show, + And straight 'tis gone as it had never been. + Soon doth it fade that makes the fairest flourish, + Short is the glory of the blushing rose, + The hue which thou so carefully dost nourish, + Yet which at length thou must be forced to lose. + When thou, surcharged with burden of thy years, + Shalt bend thy wrinkles homeward to the earth, + And that in beauty's lease expired appears + The date of age, the kalends of our death,-- + But ah! no more, this must not be foretold, + For women grieve to think they must be old. + + +XLVIII + + I must not grieve my love, whose eyes would read + Lines of delight, whereon her youth might smile; + Flowers have a time before they come to seed, + And she is young, and now must sport the while. + Ah sport, sweet maid, in season of these years, + And learn to gather flowers before they wither. + And where the sweetest blossoms first appears, + Let love and youth conduct thy pleasures thither. + Lighten forth smiles to clear the clouded air, + And calm the tempest which my sighs do raise; + Pity and smiles do best become the fair, + Pity and smiles shall yield thee lasting praise. + Make me to say, when all my griefs are gone, + Happy the heart that sighed for such a one! + + +XLIX + +_At the Author's going into Italy_ + + Ah whither, poor forsaken, wilt thou go, + To go from sorrow and thine own distress, + When every place presents like face of woe, + And no remove can make thy sorrows less! + Yet go, forsaken! Leave these woods, these plains, + Leave her and all, and all for her that leaves + Thee and thy love forlorn, and both disdains, + And of both wrongful deems and ill conceives. + Seek out some place, and see if any place + Can give the least release unto thy grief; + Convey thee from the thought of thy disgrace, + Steal from thyself and be thy cares' own thief. + But yet what comforts shall I hereby gain? + Bearing the wound, I needs must feel the pain. + + +L + +_This Sonnet was made at the Author's being in Italy_ + + Drawn with th'attractive virtue of her eyes, + My touched heart turns it to that happy coast, + My joyful north, where all my fortune lies, + The level of my hopes desired most; + There where my Delia, fairer than the sun, + Decked with her youth whereon the world doth smile, + Joys in that honour which her eyes have won, + Th'eternal wonder of our happy isle. + Flourish, fair Albion, glory of the north! + Neptune's best darling, held between his arms; + Divided from the world as better worth, + Kept for himself, defended from all harms! + Still let disarmed peace deck her and thee; + And Muse-foe Mars abroad far fostered be! + + +LI + + Care-charmer sleep, son of the sable night, + Brother to death, in silent darkness born, + Relieve my languish, and restore the light; + With dark forgetting of my care return, + And let the day be time enough to mourn + The shipwreck of my ill-adventured youth; + Let waking eyes suffice to wail their scorn, + Without the torment of the night's untruth. + Cease, dreams, the images of day-desires, + To model forth the passions of the morrow; + Never let rising sun approve you liars, + To add more grief to aggravate my sorrow; + Still let me sleep, embracing clouds in vain, + And never wake to feel the day's disdain. + + +LII + + Let others sing of knights and paladins, + In aged accents and untimely words, + Paint shadows in imaginary lines + Which well the reach of their high wits records; + But I must sing of thee and those fair eyes + Authentic shall my verse in time to come, + When yet th'unborn shall say, Lo, where she lies, + Whose beauty made him speak that else was dumb! + These are the arks, the trophies I erect, + That fortify thy name against old age; + And these thy sacred virtues must protect + Against the dark and time's consuming rage. + Though th'error of my youth in them appear, + Suffice, they show I lived and loved thee, dear. + + +LIII + + As to the Roman that would free his land, + His error was his honour and renown; + And more the fame of his mistaking hand + Than if he had the tyrant overthrown. + So Delia, hath mine error made me known, + And my deceived attempt deserved more fame, + Than if had the victory mine own, + And thy hard heart had yielded up the same. + And so likewise renowned is thy blame; + Thy cruelty, thy glory; O strange case, + That errors should be graced that merit shame, + And sin of frowns bring honour to the face. + Yet happy Delia that thou wast unkind, + Though happier far, if thou would'st change thy mind. + + +LIV + + Like as the lute delights or else dislikes + As is his art that plays upon the same, + So sounds my Muse according as she strikes + On my heart-strings high tuned unto her fame. + Her touch doth cause the warble of the sound, + Which here I yield in lamentable wise, + A wailing descant on the sweetest ground, + Whose due reports give honour to her eyes; + Else harsh my style, untunable my Muse; + Hoarse sounds the voice that praiseth not her name; + If any pleasing relish here I use, + Then judge the world her beauty gives the same. + For no ground else could make the music such, + Nor other hand could give so sweet a touch. + + +LV + + None other fame mine unambitious Muse + Affected ever but t'eternise thee; + All other honours do my hopes refuse, + Which meaner prized and momentary be. + For God forbid I should my papers blot + With mercenary lines with servile pen, + Praising virtues in them that have them not, + Basely attending on the hopes of men. + No, no, my verse respects not Thames, nor theatres; + Nor seeks it to be known unto the great; + But Avon, poor in fame, and poor in waters, + Shall have my song, where Delia hath her seat. + Avon shall be my Thames, and she my song; + No other prouder brooks shall hear my wrong. + + +LVI + + Unhappy pen, and ill-accepted lines + That intimate in vain my chaste desire, + My chaste desire, which from dark sorrow shines, + Enkindled by her eyes' celestial fire; + Celestial fire, and unrespecting powers + Which pity not the wounds made by their might, + Showed in these lines, the work of careful hours, + The sacrifice here offered to her sight. + But since she weighs them not, this rests for me: + I'll moan myself, and hide the wrong I have, + And so content me that her frowns should be + To m'infant style the cradle and the grave. + What though my Muse no honour get thereby; + Each bird sings to herself, and so will I. + + +LVII + + Lo here the impost of a faith entire, + That love doth pay, and her disdain extorts; + Behold the message of a chaste desire + That tells the world how much my grief imports. + These tributary passions, beauty's due, + I send those eyes, the cabinets of love; + That cruelty herself might grieve to view + Th'affliction her unkind disdain doth move. + And how I live, cast down from off all mirth, + Pensive, alone, only but with despair; + My joys abortive perish in their birth, + My griefs long-lived and care succeeding care. + This is my state, and Delia's heart is such; + I say no more, I fear I said too much. + + +REJECTED SONNETS + +[The following four sonnets were Numbers 3, 10, 12 and 16 in Newman's +edition of 1591. They do not appear in any other editions.] + +I + + The only bird alone that nature frames, + When weary of the tedious life she lives, + By fire dies, yet finds new life in flames, + Her ashes to her shape new essence gives. + When only I, the only wretched wight, + Weary of life that breathes but sorrow's blast, + Pursue the flame of such a beauty bright, + That burns my heart, and yet my life still lasts. + O sovereign light, that with thy sacred flame + Consumes my life, revive me after this! + And make me, with the happy bird, the same + That dies to live, by favour of thy bliss! + This deed of thine will show a goddess' power, + In so long death to grant one living hour. + + +II + + The sly enchanter when to work his will + And secret wrong on some forespoken wight, + Frames wax in form to represent aright + The poor unwitting wretch he means to kill, + And pricks the image framed by magic's skill, + Whereby to vex the party day and night; + Like hath she done, whose show bewitched my sight + To beauty's charms, her lover's blood to spill. + For first, like wax she framed me by her eyes, + Whose rays sharp-pointed set upon my breast + Martyr my life and plague me in this wise + With ling'ring pain to perish in unrest. + Nought could, save this, my sweetest fair suffice, + To try her art on him that loves her best. + + +III + + The tablet of my heavy fortunes here + Upon thine altar, Paphian Power, I place. + The grievous shipwreck of my travels dear + In bulged bark, all perished in disgrace. + That traitor Love was pilot to my woe; + My sails were hope, spread with my sighs of grief; + The twin lights which my hapless course did show + Hard by th'inconstant sands of false relief, + Were two bright stars which led my view apart. + A siren's voice allured me come so near + To perish on the marble of her heart, + A danger which my soul did never fear. + Lo, thus he fares that trusts a calm too much; + And thus fare I whose credit hath been such! + + +IV + + Weigh but the cause, and give me leave to plain me, + For all my hurt, that my heart's queen hath wrought it; + She whom I love so dear, the more to pain me, + Withholds my right where I have dearly bought it. + Dearly I bought that was so slightly rated, + Even with the price of blood and body's wasting; + She would not yield that ought might be abated, + For all she saw my love was pure and lasting, + And yet now scorns performance of the passion, + And with her presence justice overruleth. + She tells me flat her beauty bears no action; + And so my plea and process she excludeth. + What wrong she doth, the world may well perceive it, + To accept my faith at first, and then to leave it. + + +[This sonnet was Number 8 in Newman's edition of 1591, is found in the +editions of '92 and '94, but was omitted thereafter.] + +V + + Oft and in vain my rebel thoughts have ventured + To stop the passage of my vanquished heart; + And shut those ways my friendly foe first entered, + Hoping thereby to free my better part. + And whilst I guard the windows of this fort, + Where my heart's thief to vex me made her choice, + And thither all my forces do transport, + Another passage opens at her voice. + Her voice betrays me to her hand and eye, + My freedom's tyrant, conquering all by art; + But ah! what glory can she get thereby, + With three such powers to plague one silly heart! + Yet my soul's sovereign, since I must resign, + Reign in my thoughts, my love and life are thine! + + +[The following two sonnets appear for the first time in the second +edition of 1592, where they are marked 31 and 30, the 30 being evidently +a misprint for 32. They are not found in later editions.] + +VI + + Like as the spotless ermelin distressed + Circumpassed round with filth and lothsome mud, + Pines in her grief, imprisoned to her nest, + And cannot issue forth to seek her good; + So I invironed with a hatefull want, + Look to the heavens; the heavens yield forth no grace; + I search the earth, the earth I find as scant, + I view myself, myself in wofull case. + Heaven nor earth will not, myself cannot make + A way through want to free my soul from care; + But I must pine, and in my pining lurk + Lest my sad looks bewray me how I fare. + My fortune mantled with a cloud s'obscure, + Thus shades my life so long as wants endure. + + +VII + + My cares draw on mine everlasting night, + In horror's sable clouds sets my life's sun; + My life's sweet sun, my dearest comfort's light + Shall rise no more to me whose day is done. + I'll go before unto the myrtle shades, + T'attend the presence of my world's dear; + And there prepare her flowers that never fades, + And all things fit against her coming there. + If any ask me why so soon I came, + I'll hide her sin and say it was my lot. + In life and death I'll tender her good name; + My life nor death shall never be her blot. + Although this world may seem her deed to blame, + The Elysian ghosts shall never know the same. + + + + +DIANA + +BY + +HENRY CONSTABLE + + + + +HENRY CONSTABLE + + +The sonnet-cycle in the hands of Henry Constable seems to have been in +the first place rather a record of a succession of "moment's monuments" +than a single dramatic scheme, even an embryonic one. The quaint preface +found in the Harleian transcript of the _Diana_ shows this, and at the +same time tells what freedom was at that period allowed in the structure +and dove-tailing of a sonnet-cycle. It is as follows: + + "The Sonnets following are divided into 3 parts, each parte + contayning 3 several arguments and every argument 7 sonets. + + "The first parte is of variable affections of love: wherein the + first 7 be of the beginning and byrth of his love; the second 7, of + the prayse of his mistresse; the thyrd 7, of severall accidents + hapning in the tyme of his love. + + "The second is the prayse of perticulars: wherein the first 7 be of + the generall honoure of this ile, through the prayses of the heads + thereof, the Q. of England and K. of Scots; the second 7 celebrate + the memory of perticular ladies whoe the author most honoureth: the + thyrd 7 be to the honoure of perticulars, presented upon severall + occasions. + + "The thyrd parte is tragicall, conteyning only lamentations: + wherein the first 7 be complaynts onlye of misfortunes in love, the + second 7, funerall sonets of the death of perticulars; the last 7, + of the end and death of his love." + +The four sonnets to that distinguished "perticular," the King of +Scotland, seem to have won for the author a great deal of fame, for +Bolton mentions one of them as a witness to his opinion that "noble +Henry Constable was a great master in English tongue, nor had any +gentleman of our nation a more pure, quick, or higher delivery of +conceit." The King himself the poet is said to have met personally when +on his propagandist tours in Scotland; for Constable was an ardent Roman +Catholic, and spent most of his life in plots for the re-establishment +of that faith in England. Among the other "perticulars" addressed, the +Queen is of course bounteously favoured, and a number of ladies of her +Court are honoured; the series therefore lacks all pretense of unity. In +fact, the title of the 1594 edition declares that the "excellent +conceitful sonnets of Henry Constable" are "augmented with divers +quartorzains of honourable and learned personages;" and Sidney has been +found to be one of the "honourable and learned personages" whose works +were laid under contribution to make the book; but since the whole first +and second decades are the same as in the earlier volume by "H.C." which +contained also the King James sonnets attributed by numerous +contemporaries to Henry Constable, and since as yet, beside the ten by +Sidney, no more of the sonnets have by antiquarian research been traced +to their sources in the mazes of Elizabethan common-place books, it +seems but fair to leave the _Diana_ of 1594 in the hands of Constable. +All three books, the '92 and '94 editions and the manuscript volume, +show a like taste for orderly arrangement not found in general in the +sonnet-cycles. + +Constable was a Cambridge man and was thirty years old when the _Diana_ +was first printed. He lived until 1613 and bore an excellent reputation +in his day. He was the friend of Ben Jonson, who speaks of his +"ambrosaic Muse," of Sidney, Harington, Tofte, and other literary men. +If toying with the sonnet in _Diana_ seems to indicate a light and +trifling spirit, we have to yield that with Constable as with Fletcher +the graver matters of state policy formed the chief interest in life to +the author. In Constable's case the interest was religious and the poet +was personally a man of devout feeling. Writing from the Tower, where +for a time he was detained, he says, "Whether I remain in prison or go +out, I have learned to live alone with God." At the conclusion of the +third part of the Harleian Miscellany transcript, the author says: "When +I had ended this last sonnet, and found that such vain poems as I had by +idle hours writ, did amount just to the diametrical number 63, +methought it was high time for my folly to die, and to employ the +remnant of my wit to other calmer thoughts less sweet and less bitter." +It was probably in a mood like this that the poet turned from his +devotion to an earthly love and began to write his "Sonnets in honor of +God and his Saints." In this group, as in the other, he expresses that +passion for beauty characteristic of the renaissance, but here he shows +the lack of a clear conception as to where the line should be drawn +between earthly and heavenly beauty. In Constable we see the new +revelation barely emerging from the darkness, the human hand reaching +out in art toward the divine, but not knowing how to take and hold the +higher in its grasp. These sonnets are as "conceitful" as the others, +but the collection illustrates an early effort to turn the poetic energy +into a new field, to broaden the scope of subject-matter possible in +sonnet-form. The poet was evidently a close student of the +sonnet-structure. He used the Italian and the English form in about an +equal number of cases but he experiments on a large variety of +rime-arrangements besides. + +As to the personality honoured under the name of Diana, there seems to +be much obscurity. From the sonnet _To his Mistress_, we learn that +though he addresses several he loves but one. + + "Grace full of grace, though in these verses here + My love complains of others than of thee, + Yet thee alone I loved, and they by me, + Thou yet unknown, only mistaken were." + +So he loved her, it seems, while she was "yet unknown," something quite +possible in the sonneteer's world: and her personality, though shadowed +under various names, is to the poet a distinct conception. To the honour +of being this poet's inspirer, there are two claimants; one the Lady +Rich, the Stella of Sidney, the other the ill-fated Arabella Stuart. It +is noteworthy that the only one of all the sonnets addressed personally +to particular ladies that is retained in the edition of 1594, is one to +Lady Rich. But this sonnet tells us little except that "wished fortune" +had once made it possible for him to see her in all her beauty of roses +and lilies, stars and waves of gold: but this might have happened if he +had once seen that beauteous lady pass along the street in the queen's +glittering train. Other sonnets to or about the Lady Rich are equally +uncommunicative; and if the ill-starred Penelope Devereux is the one +alone that Constable loved, Time has shut the secret tightly in his +heart and will not give it up. + +The other guess is but little nearer to certainty. During the years that +Constable was pursuing his shadowy schemes, Arabella Stuart was an +object of admiration and of political jealousy; the house where she +lived was constantly spied upon, her very tutors were suspected, the +wildest schemes were formed upon her royal connections, and it would not +be strange if the heart of our poetical zealot turned toward this star +of his cause. We may be sure that he would not have been averse to a +clandestine meeting, for in writing to that arch-plotter, the Countess +of Shrewsbury, Arabella's doting grandmother, he says: "It is more +convenient to write unto your Ladyship, than to come unto you or to make +any other visits either by day or night till I have further liberty +granted me;" besides this, the Earl of Shrewsbury was distantly related +to Constable's family, and this fact of kinship may have opened the +way; while his sonnet to the Countess intimates that his heart had been +touched by some beauty in her Venus' camp. If not Arabella, who could +this be? + + "To you then, you, the fairest of the wise, + And wisest of the fair I do appeal. + A warrior of your camp by force of eyes + Me prisoner took, and will with rigour deal, + Except you pity in your heart will place, + At whose white hands I only seek for grace." + +As before, the sonnets addressed to Arabella give no definite +information. The first is in the usual strain of praise, and closes: + + "My drift was this, + Some earthly shadow of thy worth to show + Whose heavenly self above world's reason is." + +The second is as follows: + + "Only hope of our age, that virtues dead + By your sweet breath should be revived again; + Learning discouraged long by rude disdain + By your white hands is only cherished. + Thus others' worth by you is honoured. + But who shall honour yours? Poor wits, in vain + We seek to pay the debts which you pertain + Till from yourself some wealth be borrowed. + Lend some your tongues, that every nation may + In his own hear your virtuous praises blaze; + Lend them your wit, your judgment, memory, + Lest they themselves should not know what to say; + And that thou mayst be loved as much as praised, + My heart thou mayst lend them which I gave thee." + +The last of Constable's sonnets in the edition of 1592 is this +dedicatory address: + + "My mistress' worth gave wings unto my muse + And my muse wings did give unto her name, + So, like twin birds, my muse bred with her fame + Together now do learn their wings to use. + And in this book, which here you may peruse, + Abroad they fly, resolved to try the same + Adventure in their flight; and thee, sweet dame, + Both she and I for our protection choose; + I by my vow, and she by farther right + Under your phoenix (wing) presume to fly; + That from all carrion beaks in safety might + By one same wing be shrouded, she and I. + O happy, if I might but flitter there + Where you and she and I should be so near." + +The value of this author's praise, however, is somewhat impaired by the +extravagances in certain sonnets where, for instance, he honours a lady +whose soul, he says, was "endued in her lifetime with infinite +perfections as her divine poems do testify," when she on earth did sing +poet-wise angels in heaven prayed for her company, and when she died, +her "fair and glittering rays increased the light of heaven;" where +again he calls on the Countess of Essex to revenge the death of her +first husband, Sir Philip Sidney, upon the Spanish people by murdering +them _en masse_ with her eyes, and where he calls the Countess of +Shrewsbury "chieftain of Venus's host," and places her crowned in heaven +beside the Virgin Mary. Constable's zealous publisher was not far wrong +when he claimed that in this poet "conceit first claimed his birthright +to enjoy," and since we do not find either in the sonnets to Lady Rich +or in those to Lady Arabella any special tone of sincerity that leads us +to have confidence in our conjecture, we shall be compelled to leave +this puzzle unsolved. + + + + +DIANA + +UNTO HER MAJESTY'S SACRED HONOURABLE MAIDS + + + Eternal Twins! that conquer death and time, + Perpetual advocates in heaven and earth! + Fair, chaste, immaculate, and all divine, + Glorious alone, before the first man's birth; + Your twofold charities, celestial lights, + Bow your sun-rising eyes, planets of joy, + Upon these orphan poems; in whose rights + Conceit first claimed his birthright to enjoy. + If, pitiful, you shun the song of death, + Or fear the stain of love's life-dropping blood, + O know then, you are pure; and purer faith + Shall still keep white the flower, the fruit, and bud. + Love moveth all things. You that love, shall move + All things in him, and he in you shall love. + +RICHARD SMITH.[A] + +[Footnote A: Richard Smith was the publisher of the 1594 edition of the +_Diana_.] + + +TO HIS MISTRESS + + Grace full of grace, though in these verses here + My love complains of others than of thee, + Yet thee alone I loved, and they by me, + Thou yet unknown, only mistaken were. + Like him which feels a heat now here now there, + Blames now this cause now that, until he see + The fire indeed from whence they caused be; + Which fire I now do know is you, my dear, + Thus diverse loves dispersed in my verse + In thee alone for ever I unite, + And fully unto thee more to rehearse; + To him I fly for grace that rules above, + That by my grace I may live in delight, + Or by his grace I never more may love. + + +TO HIS ABSENT DIANA + + Severed from sweet content, my live's sole light, + Banished by over-weening wit from my desire, + This poor acceptance only I require: + That though my fault have forced me from thy sight + Yet that thou would'st, my sorrows to requite, + Review these sonnets, pictures of thy praise; + Wherein each woe thy wondrous worth doth raise, + Though first thy worth bereft me of delight. + See them forsaken; for I them forsook, + Forsaken first of thee, next of my sense; + And when thou deign'st on their black tears to look, + Shed not one tear, my tears to recompence; + But joy in this, though fate 'gainst me repine, + My verse still lives to witness thee divine. + + +THE FIRST DECADE + +I + +_Only of the birth and beginning of love_ + + Resolved to love, unworthy to obtain, + I do no favour crave; but, humble wise, + To thee my sighs in verse I sacrifice, + Only some pity and no help to gain. + Hear then, and as my heart shall aye remain + A patient object to thy lightning eyes, + A patient ear bring thou to thund'ring cries; + Fear not the crack, when I the blow sustain. + So as thine eye bred mine ambitious thought, + So shall thine ear make proud my voice for joy. + Lo, dear, what wonders great by thee are wrought, + When I but little favour do enjoy! + The voice is made the ear for to rejoice, + And your ear giveth pleasure to my voice. + + +II + +_An excuse to his mistress for resolving to love so worthy a creature_ + + Blame not my heart for flying up so high, + Sith thou art cause that it this flight begun; + For earthly vapours drawn up by the sun, + Comets become, and night suns in the sky. + Mine humble heart, so with thy heavenly eye + Drawn up aloft, all low desires doth shun; + Raise thou me up, as thou my heart hast done, + So during night in heaven remain may I. + I say again, blame not my high desire, + Sith of us both the cause thereof depends. + In thee doth shine, in me doth burn a fire, + Fire draws up other, and itself ascends. + Thine eye a fire, and so draws up my love; + My love a fire, and so ascends above. + + +III + +_Of the birth of his love_ + + Fly low, dear love, thy sun dost thou not see? + Take heed, do not so near his rays aspire; + Lest, for thy pride, inflamed with wreakful ire, + It burn thy wings, as it hath burned me. + Thou haply sayst thy wings immortal be, + And so cannot consumed be with fire; + And one is hope, the other is desire, + And that the heavens bestowed them both on thee. + A muse's words made thee with hope to fly, + An angel's face desire hath begot, + Thyself engendered by a goddess' eye; + Yet for all this, immortal thou art not. + Of heavenly eye though thou begotten art, + Yet art thou born but of a mortal heart. + + +IV + +_Of his mistress, upon occasion of a friend of his which dissuaded him +from loving_ + + A friend of mine, pitying my hopeless love, + Hoping by killing hope my love to stay, + "Let not," quoth he, "thy hope, thy heart betray; + Impossible it is her heart to move." + But sith resolved love cannot remove + As long as thy divine perfections stay, + Thy godhead then he sought to take away. + Dear, seek revenge and him a liar prove; + Gods only do impossibilities. + "Impossible," saith he, "thy grace to gain." + Show then the power of divinities + By granting me thy favour to obtain. + So shall thy foe give to himself the lie; + A goddess thou shall prove, and happy I! + + +V + +_Of the conspiracy of his lady's eyes and his own to engender love_ + + Thine eye the glass where I behold my heart, + Mine eye the window through the which thine eye + May see my heart, and there thyself espy + In bloody colours how thou painted art. + Thine eye the pile is of a murdering dart; + Mine eye the sight thou tak'st thy level by + To hit my heart, and never shoot'st awry. + Mine eye thus helps thine eye to work my smart. + Thine eye a fire is both in heat and light; + Mine eye of tears a river doth become. + O that the water of mine eye had might + To quench the flames that from thine eye doth come, + Or that the fires kindled by thine eye, + The flowing streams of mine eyes could make dry. + + +VI + +_Love's seven deadly sins_ + + Mine eye with all the deadly sins is fraught. + First _proud_, sith it presumed to look so high. + A watchman being made, stood gazing by, + And _idle_, took no heed till I was caught. + And _envious_, bears envy that by thought + Should in his absence be to her so nigh. + To kill my heart, mine eye let in her eye; + And so consent gave to a _murder_ wrought. + And _covetous_, it never would remove + From her fair hair, gold so doth please his sight. + _Unchaste_, a baud between my heart and love. + A _glutton_ eye, with tears drunk every night. + These sins procured have a goddess' ire, + Wherefore my heart is damned in love's sweet fire. + + +VII + +_Of the slander envy gives him for so highly praising his mistress_ + + Falsely doth envy of your praises blame + My tongue, my pen, my heart of flattery, + Because I said there was no sun but thee. + It called my tongue the partial trump of fame, + And saith my pen hath flattered thy name, + Because my pen did to my tongue agree; + And that my heart must needs a flatterer be, + Which taught both tongue and pen to say the same. + No, no, I flatter not when thee I call + The sun, sith that the sun was never such; + But when the sun thee I compared withal, + Doubtless the sun I flattered too much. + Witness mine eyes, I say the truth in this, + They have seen thee and know that so it is. + + +VIII + +_Of the end and death of his love_ + + Much sorrow in itself my love doth move, + More my despair to love a hopeless bliss, + My folly most to love whom sure to miss + O help me, but this last grief to remove; + All pains, if you command, it joy shall prove, + And wisdom to seek joy. Then say but this, + "Because my pleasure in thy torment is, + I do command thee without hope to love!" + So when this thought my sorrow shall augment + That my own folly did procure my pain, + Then shall I say to give myself content, + "Obedience only made me love in vain. + It was your will, and not my want of wit; + I have the pain, bear you the blame of it!" + + +IX + +_Upon occasion of her walking in a garden_ + + My lady's presence makes the roses red, + Because to see her lips they blush with shame. + The lily's leaves for envy pale became, + And her white hands in them this envy bred. + The marigold the leaves abroad doth spread, + Because the sun's and her power is the same. + The violet of purple colour came, + Dyed in the blood she made my heart to shed. + In brief, all flowers from her their virtue take; + From her sweet breath their sweet smells do proceed; + The living heat which her eyebeams doth make + Warmeth the ground and quickeneth the seed. + The rain wherewith she watereth the flowers, + Falls from mine eyes which she dissolves in showers. + + +X + +_To the Lady Rich_ + + Heralds at arms do three perfections quote, + To wit, most fair, most rich, most glittering; + So when those three concur within one thing, + Needs must that thing of honour be a note. + Lately I did behold a rich fair coat, + Which wished fortune to mine eyes did bring. + A lordly coat, yet worthy of a king, + In which one might all these perfections note. + A field of lilies, roses proper bare; + Two stars in chief; the crest was waves of gold. + How glittering 'twas, might by the stars appear; + The lilies made it fair for to behold. + And rich it was as by the gold appeareth; + But happy he that in his arms it weareth! + + +THE SECOND DECADE + +I + +_Of the end and death of his love_ + + If true love might true love's reward obtain, + Dumb wonder only might speak of my joy; + But too much worth hath made thee too much coy, + And told me long ago I sighed in vain. + Not then vain hope of undeserved gain + Hath made me paint in verses mine annoy, + But for thy pleasure, that thou might'st enjoy + Thy beauty's praise, in glasses of my pain. + See then, thyself, though me thou wilt not hear, + By looking on my verse. For pain in verse, + Love doth in pain, beauty in love appear. + So if thou would'st my verses' meaning see, + Expound them thus, when I my love rehearse: + "None loves like he!" that is, "None fair like me!" + + +II + +_How he encouraged himself to proceed in love, and to hope for favour in +the end at love's hands_ + + It may be, love my death doth not pretend, + Although he shoots at me, but thinks it fit + Thus to bewitch thee for thy benefit, + Causing thy will to my wish to condescend. + For witches which some murder do intend, + Do make a picture and do shoot at it; + And in that part where they the picture hit, + The party's self doth languish to his end. + So love, too weak by force thy heart to taint, + Within my heart thy heavenly shape doth paint; + Suffering therein his arrows to abide, + Only to th'end he might by witches' art, + Within my heart pierce through thy picture's side, + And through thy picture's side might wound my heart. + + +III + +_Of the thoughts he nourished by night when she was retired to bed_ + + The sun, his journey ending in the west, + Taketh his lodging up in Thetis' bed; + Though from our eyes his beams be banished, + Yet with his light th' antipodes be blest. + Now when the sun-time brings my sun to rest, + Which me too oft of rest hath hindered, + And whiter skin with white sheet covered, + And softer cheek doth on soft pillow rest, + Then I, O sun of suns! and light of lights! + Wish me with those antipodes to be, + Which see and feel thy beams and heat by nights. + Well, though the night both cold and darksome is, + Yet half the day's delight the night grants me, + I feel my sun's heat, though his light I miss. + + +IV + +_Of his lady's praise_ + + Lady, in beauty and in favour rare, + Of favour, not of due, I favour crave. + Nature to thee beauty and favour gave; + Fair then thou art, and favour thou may'st spare. + Nor when on me bestowed your favours are, + Less favour in your face you shall not have; + If favour then a wounded soul may save, + Of murder's guilt, dear Lady, then beware. + My loss of life a million fold were less + Than the least loss should unto you befall; + Yet grant this gift; which gift when I possess, + Both I have life and you no loss at all. + For by your favour only I do live, + And favour you may well both keep and give. + + +V + +_Of the end and death of his love_ + + My reason absent did mine eyes require + To watch and ward and such foes to descry + As they should ne'er my heart approaching spy; + But traitor eyes my heart's death did conspire, + Corrupted with hope's gifts; let in desire + To burn my heart; and sought no remedy, + Though store of water were in either eye, + Which well employed, might well have quenched the fire. + Reason returned; love and fortune made + Judges, to judge mine eyes to punishment. + Fortune, sith they by sight my heart betrayed + From wished sight, adjudged them banishment; + Love, sith by fire murdered my heart was found, + Adjudged them in tears for to be drowned. + + +VI + +_Of several complaints of misfortune in love only_ + + Wonder it is and pity is't that she + In whom all beauty's treasure we may find, + That may unrich the body and the mind, + Towards the poor should use no charity. + My love has gone a begging unto thee. + And if that beauty had not been more kind + That pity, long ere this he had been pined; + But beauty is content his food to be. + O pity have when such poor orphans beg! + Love, naked boy, hath nothing on his back; + And though he wanteth neither arm nor leg, + Yet maimed he is sith he his sight doth lack. + And yet though blind he beauty can behold, + And yet though naked he feels more heat than cold. + + +VII + +_Of several complaints of misfortune in love only_ + + Pity refusing my poor love to feed, + A beggar starved for want of help he lies; + And at your mouth, the door of beauty, cries, + That thence some alms of sweet grants might proceed. + But as he waiteth for some almes deed, + A cherry tree before the door he spies. + "O dear," quoth he, "two cherries may suffice. + Two only may save life in this my need." + But beggars, can they nought but cherries eat? + Pardon my love, he is a goddess' son, + And never feedeth but on dainty meat, + Else need he not to pine, as he hath done; + For only the sweet fruit of this sweet tree + Can give food to my love and life to me. + + +VIII + +_Of his lady's veil wherewith she covered her_ + + The fowler hides as closely as he may + The net, where caught the silly bird should be, + Lest he the threatening poison should but see, + And so for fear be forced to fly away. + My lady so, the while she doth assay + In curled knots fast to entangle me, + Put on her veil, to th' end I should not flee + The golden net wherein I am a prey. + Alas, most sweet! what need is of a net + To catch a bird that is already ta'en? + Sith with your hand alone you may it get, + For it desires to fly into the same. + What needs such art my thoughts then to entrap, + When of themselves they fly into your lap? + + +IX + +_To his lady's hand upon occasion of her glove which in her absence he +kissed_ + + Sweet hand, the sweet but cruel bow thou art, + From whence at me five ivory arrows fly; + So with five wounds at once I wounded lie, + Bearing my breast the print of every dart. + Saint Francis had the like, yet felt no smart, + Where I in living torments never die. + His wounds were in his hands and feet; where I + All these five helpless wounds feel in my heart. + Now, as Saint Francis, if a saint am I, + The bow that shot these shafts a relic is; + I mean the hand, which is the reason why + So many for devotion thee would kiss: + And some thy glove kiss as a thing divine, + This arrows' quiver, and this relic's shrine. + + +X + +_Of his lady's going over early to bed, so depriving him too soon of her +sight_ + + Fair sun, if you would have me praise your light, + When night approacheth wherefore do you fly? + Time is so short, beauties so many be, + As I have need to see them day and night, + That by continual view my verses might + Tell all the beams of your divinity; + Which praise to you and joy should be to me, + You living by my verse, I by your sight; + I by your sight, and not you by my verse, + Need mortal skill immortal praise rehearse? + No, no, though eyes were blind, and verse were dumb, + Your beauty should be seen and your fame known; + For by the wind which from my sighs do come, + Your praises round about the world are blown. + + +THE THIRD DECADE + +I + +_Complaint of his lady's sickness_ + + Uncivil sickness, hast thou no regard, + But dost presume my dearest to molest, + And without leave dar'st enter in that breast + Whereto sweet love approach yet never dared? + Spare thou her health, which my life hath not spared; + Too bitter such revenge of my unrest! + Although with wrongs my thought she hath opprest, + My wrongs seek not revenge, they crave reward + Cease, sickness, cease in her then to remain; + And come and welcome, harbour thou in me + Whom love long since hath taught to suffer in! + So she which hath so oft my pain increased, + O God, that I might so revenged be, + By my poor pain might have her pain released! + + +[The Sonnets numbered II to VIII in this Decade are by Sidney, and were +printed among the _Certaine Sonets_ in the 1598 edition of the +_Arcadia_.] + + +IX + + Woe to mine eyes, the organs of mine ill; + Hate to my heart, for not concealing joy; + A double curse upon my tongue be still, + Whose babbling lost what else I might enjoy! + When first mine eyes did with thy beauty joy, + They to my heart thy wondrous virtues told; + Who, fearing lest thy beams should him destroy, + Whate'er he knew, did to my tongue unfold. + My tell-tale tongue, in talking over bold, + What they in private council did declare, + To thee, in plain and public terms unrolled; + And so by that made thee more coyer far. + What in thy praise he spoke, that didst thou trust; + And yet my sorrows thou dost hold unjust. + + +X + + Of an Athenian young man have I read, + Who on blind fortune's picture doated so, + That when he could not buy it to his bed, + On it he gazing died for very woe. + My fortune's picture art thou, flinty dame, + That settest golden apples to my sight; + But wilt by no means let me taste the same. + To drown in sight of land is double spite. + Of fortune as thou learn'dst to be unkind, + So learn to be unconstant to disdain. + The wittiest women are to sport inclined. + Honour is pride, and pride is nought but pain. + Let others boast of choosing for the best; + 'Tis substances not names must make us blest. + + +THE FOURTH DECADE + +I + +_Of the end and death of his love_ + + Needs must I leave and yet needs must I love; + In vain my wit doth tell in verse my woe; + Despair in me, disdain in thee, doth show + How by my wit I do my folly prove. + All this my heart from love can never move. + Love is not in my heart. No, Lady, no, + My heart is love itself. Till I forego + My heart I never can my love remove. + How can I then leave love? I do intend + Not to crave grace, but yet to wish it still; + Not to praise thee, but beauty to commend; + And so, by beauty's praise, praise thee I will; + For as my heart is love, love not in me, + So beauty thou, beauty is not in thee. + + +II + +_Of the prowess of his lady_ + + Sweet sovereign, since so many minds remain + Obedient subjects at thy beauty's call, + So many hearts bound in thy hairs as thrall, + So many eyes die with one look's disdain, + Go, seek the honour that doth thee pertain, + That the Fifth Monarchy may thee befall! + Thou hast such means to conquer men withal, + As all the world must yield or else be slain. + To fight, thou need'st no weapons but thine eyes, + Thine hair hath gold enough to pay thy men, + And for their food thy beauty will suffice; + For men and armour, Lady, care have none; + For one will sooner yield unto thee then + When he shall meet thee naked all alone. + + +III + +_Of the discouragement he had to proceed in love, through the multitude +of his lady's perfections and his own lowness_ + + When your perfections to my thoughts appear, + They say among themselves, "O happy we, + Whichever shall so rare an object see!" + But happy heart, if thoughts less happy were! + For their delights have cost my heart full dear, + In whom of love a thousand causes be, + And each cause breeds a thousand loves in me, + And each love more than thousand hearts can bear. + How can my heart so many loves then hold, + Which yet by heaps increase from day to day? + But like a ship that's o'ercharged with gold, + Must either sink or hurl the gold away. + But hurl not love; thou canst not, feeble heart; + In thine own blood, thou therefore drowned art! + + +IV + + Fools be they that inveigh 'gainst Mahomet, + Who's but a moral of love's monarchy. + But a dull adamant, as straw by jet, + He in an iron chest was drawn on high. + In midst of Mecca's temple roof, some say, + He now hangs without touch or stay at all. + That Mahomet is she to whom I pray; + May ne'er man pray so ineffectual! + Mine eyes, love's strange exhaling adamants, + Un'wares, to my heart's temple's height have wrought + The iron idol that compassion wants, + Who my oft tears and travails sets at nought. + Iron hath been transformed to gold by art; + Her face, limbs, flesh and all, gold; save her heart. + + +V + + Ready to seek out death in my disgrace, + My mistress 'gan to smooth her gathered brows, + Whereby I am reprieved for a space. + O hope and fear! who half your torments knows? + It is some mercy in a black-mouthed judge + To haste his prisoner's end, if he must die. + Dear, if all other favour you shall grudge, + Do speedy execution with your eye; + With one sole look you leave in me no soul! + Count it a loss to lose a faithful slave. + Would God, that I might hear my last bell toll, + So in your bosom I might dig a grave! + Doubtful delay is worse than any fever, + Or help me soon, or cast me off for ever! + + +VI + +_Of the end and death of his love_ + + Each day, new proofs of new despair I find, + That is, new deaths. No marvel then, though I + Make exile my last help; to th'end mine eye + Should not behold the death to me assigned. + Not that from death absence might save my mind, + But that it might take death more patiently; + Like him, the which by judge condemned to die, + To suffer with more ease, his eyes doth blind. + Your lips in scarlet clad, my judges be, + Pronouncing sentence of eternal "No!" + Despair, the hangman that tormenteth me; + The death I suffer is the life I have. + For only life doth make me die in woe, + And only death I for my pardon crave. + + +VII + + The richest relic Rome did ever view + Was' Caesar's tomb; on which, with cunning hand, + Jove's triple honours, the three fair Graces, stand, + Telling his virtues in their virtues true. + This Rome admired; but dearest dear, in you + Dwelleth the wonder of the happiest land, + And all the world to Neptune's furthest strand, + For what Rome shaped hath living life in you. + Thy naked beauty, bounteously displayed, + Enricheth monarchies of hearts with love; + Thine eyes to hear complaints are open laid; + Thine eyes' kind looks requite all pains I prove; + That of my death I dare not thee accuse; + But pride in me that baser chance refuse. + + +VIII + + Why thus unjustly, say, my cruel fate, + Dost thou adjudge my luckless eyes and heart, + The one to live exiled from that sweet smart, + Where th' other pines, imprisoned without date? + My luckless eyes must never more debate + Of those bright beams that eased my love apart; + And yet my heart, bound to them with love's dart, + Must there dwell ever to bemoan my state. + O had mine eyes been suffered there to rest, + Often they had my heart's unquiet eased; + Or had my heart with banishment been blest, + Mine eye with beauty never had been pleased! + But since these cross effects hath fortune wrought, + Dwell, heart, with her; eyes, view her in my thought! + + +[The Sonnet numbered IX is by Sidney, and is found in the _Certaine +Sonets_ printed in the 1598 edition of the _Arcadia_.] + + +X + + Hope, like the hyaena, coming to be old, + Alters his shape, is turned into despair. + Pity my hoary hopes, Maid of clear mould! + Think not that frowns can ever make thee fair. + What harm is it to kiss, to laugh, to play? + Beauty's no blossom, if it be not used. + Sweet dalliance keeps the wrinkles long away; + Repentance follows them that have refused. + To bring you to the knowledge of your good, + I seek, I sue. O try and then believe! + Each image can be chaste that's carved of wood. + You show you live, when men you do relieve. + Iron with wearing shines; rust wasteth treasure. + On earth but love there is no other pleasure. + + +THE FIFTH DECADE + +I + + Ay me, poor wretch, my prayer is turned to sin! + I say, "I love!" My mistress says "'Tis lust!" + Thus most we lose where most we seek to win. + Wit will make wicked what is ne'er so just. + And yet I can supplant her false surmise. + Lust is a fire that for an hour or twain + Giveth a scorching blaze and then he dies; + Love a continual furnace doth maintain. + A furnace! Well, this a furnace may be called; + For it burns inward, yields a smothering flame, + Sighs which, like boiled lead's smoking vapour, scald. + I sigh apace at echo of sighs' name. + Long have I served; no short blaze is my love. + Hid joys there are that maids scorn till they prove. + + +II + + I do not now complain of my disgrace, + O cruel fair one! fair with cruel crost; + Nor of the hour, season, time, nor place; + Nor of my foil, for any freedom lost; + Nor of my courage, by misfortune daunted; + Nor of my wit, by overweening struck; + Nor of my sense, by any sound enchanted; + Nor of the force of fiery-pointed hook; + Nor of the steel that sticks within my wound; + Nor of my thoughts, by worser thoughts defaced; + Nor of the life I labour to confound. + But I complain, that being thus disgraced, + Fired, feared, frantic, fettered, shot through, slain, + My death is such as I may not complain. + + +III + + If ever sorrow spoke from soul that loves, + As speaks a spirit in a man possest, + In me her spirit speaks. My soul it moves, + Whose sigh-swoll'n words breed whirlwinds in my breast; + Or like the echo of a passing bell, + Which sounding on the water seems to howl; + So rings my heart a fearful heavy knell, + And keeps all night in consort with the owl. + My cheeks with a thin ice of tears are clad, + Mine eyes like morning stars are bleared and red. + What resteth then but I be raging mad, + To see that she, my cares' chief conduit-head, + When all streams else help quench my burning heart, + Shuts up her springs and will no grace impart. + + +IV + + You secret vales, you solitary fields, + You shores forsaken and you sounding rocks! + If ever groaning heart hath made you yield, + Or words half spoke that sense in prison locks, + Then 'mongst night shadows whisper out my death. + That when myself hath sealed my lips from speaking, + Each tell-tale echo with a weeping breath, + May both record my truth and true love's breaking. + You pretty flowers that smile for summer's sake, + Pull in your heads before my wat'ry eyes + Do turn the meadows to a standing lake, + By whose untimely floods your glory dies! + For lo, mine heart, resolved to moistening air, + Feedeth mine eyes which double tear for tear. + + +V + + His shadow to Narcissus well presented, + How fair he was by such attractive love! + So if thou would'st thyself thy beauty prove, + Vulgar breath-mirrors might have well contented, + And to their prayers eternally consented, + Oaths, vows and sighs, if they believe might move; + But more thou forc'st, making my pen approve + Thy praise to all, least any had dissented. + When this hath wrought, thou which before wert known + But unto some, of all art now required, + And thine eyes' wonders wronged, because not shown + The world, with daily orisons desired. + Thy chaste fair gifts, with learning's breath is blown, + And thus my pen hath made thy sweets admired. + + +VI + + I am no model figure, or sign of care, + But his eternal heart's-consuming essence, + In whom grief's commentaries written are, + Drawing gross passion into pure quintessence, + Not thine eye's fire, but fire of thine eye's disdain, + Fed by neglect of my continual grieving, + Attracts the true life's spirit of my pain, + And gives it thee, which gives me no relieving. + Within thine arms sad elegies I sing; + Unto thine eyes a true heart love-torn lay I: + Thou smell'st from me the savours sorrows bring; + My tears to taste my truth to touch display I. + Lo thus each sense, dear fair one, I importune; + But being care, thou flyest me as ill fortune. + + +VII + + But being care, thou flyest me as ill fortune;-- + Care the consuming canker of the mind! + The discord that disorders sweet hearts' tune! + Th' abortive bastard of a coward mind! + The lightfoot lackey that runs post by death, + Bearing the letters which contain our end! + The busy advocate that sells his breath, + Denouncing worst to him, is most his friend! + O dear, this care no interest holds in me; + But holy care, the guardian of thy fair, + Thine honour's champion, and thy virtue's fee, + The zeal which thee from barbarous times shall bear, + This care am I; this care my life hath taken. + Dear to my soul, then leave me not forsaken! + + +VIII + + Dear to my soul, then, leave, me not forsaken! + Fly not! My heart within thy bosom sleepeth; + Even from myself and sense I have betaken + Me unto thee for whom my spirit weepeth, + And on the shore of that salt teary sea, + Couched in a bed of unseen seeming pleasure, + Where in imaginary thoughts thy fair self lay; + But being waked, robbed of my life's best treasure, + I call the heavens, air, earth, and seas to hear + My love, my truth, and black disdained estate, + Beating the rocks with bellowings of despair, + Which still with plaints my words reverberate, + Sighing, "Alas, what shall become of me?" + Whilst echo cries, "What shall become of me?" + + +IX + + Whilst echo cries, "What shall become of me?" + And desolate, my desolations pity, + Thou in thy beauty's carack sitt'st to see + My tragic downfall, and my funeral ditty. + No timbrel, but my heart thou play'st upon, + Whose strings are stretched unto the highest key; + The diapason, love; love is the unison; + In love my life and labours waste away. + Only regardless to the world thou leav'st me, + Whilst slain hopes, turning from the feast of sorrow, + Unto despair, their king, which ne'er deceives me, + Captives my heart, whose black night hates the morrow, + And he in truth of my distressed cry + Plants me a weeping star within mine eye. + + +X + + Prometheus for stealing living fire + From heaven's king, was judged eternal death; + In self-same flame with unrelenting ire + Bound fast to Caucasus' low foot beneath. + So I, for stealing living beauty's fire + Into my verse that it may always live, + And change his forms to shapes of my desire, + Thou beauty's queen, self sentence like dost give. + Bound to thy feet in chains of life I lie; + For to thine eyes I never dare aspire; + And in thy beauty's brightness do I fry, + As poor Prometheus in the scalding fire; + Which tears maintain as oil the lamp revives; + Only my succour in thy favour lies. + + +THE SIXTH DECADE + +I + + One sun unto my life's day gives true light. + One moon dissolves my stormy night of woes. + One star my fate and happy fortune shows. + One saint I serve, one shrine with vows I dight. + One sun transfix'd hath burnt my heart outright, + One moon opposed my love in darkness throws. + One star hath bid my thoughts my wrongs disclose. + Saints scorn poor swains, shrines do my vows no right. + Yet if my love be found a holy fire, + Pure, unstained, without idolatry, + And she nathless in hate of my desire, + Lives to repose her in my misery, + My sun, my moon, my star, my saint, my shrine, + Mine be the torment but the guilt be thine! + + +II + + To live in hell, and heaven to behold; + To welcome life, and die a living death; + To sweat with heat, and yet be freezing cold; + To grasp at stars, and lie the earth beneath; + To treat a maze that never shall have end; + To burn in sighs, and starve in daily tears; + To climb a hill, and never to descend; + Giants to kill, and quake at childish fears; + To pine for food, and watch th' Hesperian tree; + To thirst for drink, and nectar still to draw; + To live accurs'd whom men hold blest to be, + And weep those wrongs which never creature saw: + If this be love, if love in these be founded, + My heart is love, for these in it are grounded. + + +III + + A carver, having loved too long in vain, + Hewed out the portraiture of Venus' son + In marble rock, upon the which did rain + Small drizzling drops, that from a fount did run: + Imagining the drops would either wear + His fury out, or quench his living flame; + But when he saw it bootless did appear, + He swore the water did augment the same. + So I, that seek in verse to carve thee out, + Hoping thy beauty will my flame allay, + Viewing my verse and poems all throughout, + Find my will rather to my love obey, + That with the carver I my work do blame, + Finding it still th' augmenter of my flame. + + +IV + + Astronomers the heavens do divide + Into eight houses, where the god remains; + All which in thy perfections do abide. + For in thy feet, the queen of silence reigns; + About thy waist Jove's messenger doth dwell, + Inchanting me as I thereat admire; + And on thy dugs the queen of love doth tell + Her godhead's power in scrolls of my desire; + Thy beauty is the world's eternal sun; + Thy favours force a coward's heart to dare, + And in thy hairs Jove and his riches won. + Thy frowns hold Saturn; thine's the fixed stars. + Pardon me then, divine, to love thee well, + Since thou art heaven, and I in heaven would dwell! + + +V + + Weary of love, my thoughts of love complained, + Till reason told them there was no such power, + And bade me view fair beauty's richest flower, + To see if there a naked boy remained. + Dear, to thine eyes, eyes that my soul hath pained, + Thoughts turned them back in that unhappy hour + To see if love kept there his royal bower, + For if not there, then no place him contained. + There was he not, nor boy, nor golden bow; + Yet as thou turned thy chaste fair eye aside, + A flame of fire did from thine eyelids go, + Which burnt my heart through my sore wounded side; + Then with a sigh, reason made thoughts to cry, + "There is no god of love, save that thine eye!" + + +VI + + Forgive me, dear, for thundering on thy name; + Sure 'tis thyself that shows my love distrest. + For fire exhaled in freezing clouds possessed, + Warring for way, makes all the heavens exclaim. + Thy beauty so, the brightest living flame, + Wrapt in my cloudy heart, by winter prest, + Scorning to dwell within so base a nest, + Thunders in me thy everlasting flame. + O that my heart might still contain that fire! + Or that the fire would always light my heart! + Then should'st thou not disdain my true desire, + Or think I wronged thee to reveal to my smart; + For as the fire through freezing clouds doth break, + So not myself but thou in me would'st speak. + + +VII + + My heart mine eye accuseth of his death, + Saying his wanton sight bred his unrest; + Mine eye affirms my heart's unconstant faith + Hath been his bane, and all his joys repressed. + My heart avows mine eye let in the fire, + Which burns him with an everliving light. + Mine eye replies my greedy heart's desire + Let in those floods, which drown him day and night. + Thus wars my heart which reason doth maintain, + And calls my eye to combat if he dare, + The whilst my soul impatient of disdain, + Wrings from his bondage unto death more near; + Save that my love still holdeth him in hand; + A kingdom thus divided cannot stand! + + +VIII + + Unhappy day, unhappy month and season, + When first proud love, my joys away adjourning, + Poured into mine eye to her eye turning + A deadly juice, unto my green thought's reason. + Prisoner I am unto the eye I gaze on; + Eternally my love's flame is in burning; + A mortal shaft still wounds me in my mourning; + Thus prisoned, burnt and slain, the spirit, soul and reason. + What tides me then since these pains which annoy me, + In my despair are evermore increasing? + The more I love, less is my pain's releasing; + That cursed be the fortune which destroys me, + The hour, the month, the season, and the cause, + When love first made me thrall to lovers' laws. + + +IX + + Love hath I followed all too long, nought gaining; + And sighed I have in vain to sweet what smarteth, + But from his brow a fiery arrow parteth, + Thinking that I should him resist not plaining. + But cowardly my heart submiss remaining, + Yields to receive what shaft thy fair eye darteth. + Well do I see thine eye my bale imparteth, + And that save death no hope I am detaining. + For what is he can alter fortune's sliding? + One in his bed consumes his life away, + Other in wars, another in the sea; + The like effects in me have their abiding; + For heavens avowed my fortune should be such, + That I should die by loving far too much. + + +X + + My God, my God, how much I love my goddess, + Whose virtues rare, unto the heavens arise! + My God, my God, how much I love her eyes + One shining bright, the other full of hardness! + My God, my God, how much I love her wisdom, + Whose works may ravish heaven's richest maker! + Of whose eyes' joys if I might be partaker + Then to my soul a holy rest would come. + My God, how much I love to hear her speak! + Whose hands I kiss and ravished oft rekisseth, + When she stands wotless whom so much she blesseth. + Say then, what mind this honest love would break; + Since her perfections pure, withouten blot, + Makes her beloved of thee, she knoweth not? + + +THE SEVENTH DECADE + +I + + The first created held a joyous bower, + A flowering field, the world's sole wonderment, + High Paradise, from whence a woman's power + Enticed him to fall to endless banishment. + This on the banks of Euphrates did stand, + Till the first Mover, by his wondrous might, + Planted it in thine eyes, thy face, thy hands, + From whence the world receives his fairest light. + Thy cheeks contain choice flowers; thy eyes, two suns; + Thy hands, the fruit that no life blood can stain; + And in thy breath, that heavenly music wons, + Which, when thou speak'st, angels their voices strain. + As from the first thy sex exiled me, + So to this next let me be called by thee! + + +II + + Fair grace of graces, muse of muses all, + Thou Paradise, thou only heaven I know! + What influence hath bred my hateful woe, + That I from thee and them am forced to fall? + Thou falled from me, from thee I never shall, + Although my fortunes thou hast brought so low; + Yet shall my faith and service with thee go, + For live I do, on heaven and thee to call. + Banish'd all grace, no graces with me dwell; + Compelled to muse, my muses from me fly; + Excluded heaven, what can remain but hell? + Exiled from paradise, in hate I lie, + Cursing my stars; albeit I find it true, + I lost all these when I lost love and you. + + +III + + What viewed I, dear, when I thine eyes beheld? + Love in his glory? No, him Thyrsis saw, + And stood the boy, whilst he his darts did draw, + Whose painted pride to baser swains he telled. + Saw I two suns? That sight is seen but seld. + Yet can their brood that teach the holy law + Gaze on their beams, and dread them not a straw, + Where princely looks are by their eyes repelled. + What saw I then? Doubtless it was Amen, + Armed with strong thunder and a lightning's flame, + Who bridegroom like with power was riding then, + Meaning that none should see him when he came. + Yet did I gaze; and thereby caught the wound + Which burns my heart and keeps my body sound. + + +IV + + When tedious much and over weary long, + Cruel disdain reflecting from her brow, + Hath been the cause that I endured such wrong + And rest thus discontent and weary now. + Yet when posterity in time to come, + Shall find th' uncancelled tenour of her vow, + And her disdain be then confessed of some, + How much unkind and long, I find it now, + O yet even then--though then will be too late + To comfort me; dead, many a day, ere then-- + They shall confess I did not force her heart; + And time shall make it known to other men + That ne'er had her disdain made me despair, + Had she not been so excellently fair. + + +V + + Had she not been so excellently fair, + My muse had never mourned in lines of woe; + But I did too inestimable weigh her, + And that's the cause I now lament me so. + Yet not for her contempt do I complain me: + Complaints may ease the mind, but that is all; + Therefore though she too constantly disdain me, + I can but sigh and grieve, and so I shall. + Yet grieve I not because I must grieve ever; + And yet, alas, waste tears away, in vain; + I am resolved truly to persever, + Though she persisteth in her old disdain. + But that which grieves me most is that I see + Those which most fair, the most unkindest be. + + +VI + + Thus long imposed to everlasting plaining, + Divinely constant to the worthiest fair, + And moved by eternally disdaining, + Aye to persever in unkind despair: + Because now silence wearily confined + In tedious dying and a dumb restraint, + Breaks forth in tears from mine unable mind + To ease her passion by a poor complaint; + O do not therefore to thyself suggest + That I can grieve to have immured so long + Upon the matter of mine own unrest; + Such grief is not the tenour of my song, + That 'bide so zealously so bad a wrong. + My grief is this; unless I speak and plain me, + Thou wilt persever ever to disdain me. + + +VII + + Thou wilt persever ever to disdain me; + And I shall then die, when thou will repent it. + O do not therefore from complaint restrain me, + And take my life from me, to me that lent it! + For whilst these accents, weepingly exprest + In humble lines of reverentest zeal, + Have issue to complaint from mine unrest, + They but thy beauty's wonder shall reveal; + And though the grieved muse of some other lover, + Whose less devotions knew but woes like mine, + Would rather seek occasion to discover + How little pitiful and how much unkind, + They other not so worthy beauties find. + O, I not so! but seek with humble prayer, + Means how to move th' unmercifullest fair. + + +VIII + + As draws the golden meteor of the day + Exhaled matter from the ground to heaven, + And by his secret nature, there to stay + The thing fast held, and yet of hold bereaven; + So by th' attractive excellence and might, + Born to the power of thy transparent eyes, + Drawn from myself, ravished with thy delight, + Whose dumb conceits divinely sirenise, + Lo, in suspense of fear and hope upholden, + Diversely poised with passions that pain me, + No resolution dares my thoughts embolden, + Since 'tis not I, but thou that dost sustain me. + O if there's none but thou can work my woe, + Wilt thou be still unkind and kill me so? + + +IX + + Wilt thou be still unkind and kill me so, + Whose humbled vows with sorrowful appeal + Do still persist, and did so long ago + Intreat for pity with so pure a zeal? + Suffice the world shall, for the world can say + How much thy power hath power, and what it can; + Never was victor-hand yet moved to slay + The rendered captive, or the yielding man. + Then, O, why should thy woman-thought impose + Death and disdain on him that yields his breath, + To free his soul from discontent and woes, + And humble sacrifice to a certain death? + O since the world knows what the power can do, + What were't for thee to save and love me too? + + +X + + I meet not mine by others' discontent, + For none compares with me in true devotion; + Yet though my tears and sighs to her be spent, + Her cruel heart disdains what they do motion. + Yet though persisting in eternal hate, + To aggravate the cause of my complaining, + Her fury ne'er confineth with a date, + I will not cease to love, for her disdaining. + Such puny thoughts of unresolved ground, + Whose inaudacity dares but base conceit, + In me and my love never shall be found. + Those coward thoughts unworthy minds await. + But those that love well have not yet begun; + Persever ever and have never done! + + +THE EIGHTH DECADE + +I + + Persever ever and have never done, + You weeping accent of my weary song! + O do not you eternal passions shun, + But be you true and everlasting long! + Say that she doth requite you with disdain; + Yet fortified with hope, endure your fortune; + Though cruel now she will be kind again; + Such haps as those, such loves as yours importune. + Though she protests the faithfullest severity + Inexecrable beauty is inflicting, + Kindness in time will pity your sincerity, + Though now it be your fortune's interdicting. + For some can say, whose loves have known like passion, + "Women are kind by kind, and coy for fashion." + + +II + + Give period to my matter of complaining, + Fair wonder of our time's admiring eye, + And entertain no more thy long disdaining, + Or give me leave at last that I may die. + For who can live, perpetually secluded + From death to life, that loathes her discontent? + Lest by some hope seducively deluded, + Such thoughts aspire to fortunate event; + But I that now have drawn mal-pleasant breath + Under the burden of thy cruel hate, + O, I must long and linger after death, + And yet I dare not give my life her date; + For if I die and thou repent t' have slain me, + 'Twill grieve me more than if thou didst disdain me. + + +III + + 'Twill grieve me more than if thou didst disdain me, + That I should die; and thou, because I die so. + And yet to die, it should not know to pain me, + If cruel beauty were content to bid so. + Death to my life, life to my long despair + Prolonged by her, given to my love and days, + Are means to tell how truly she is fair, + And I can die to testify her praise. + Yet not to die, though fairness me despiseth, + Is cause why in complaint I thus persever; + Though death me and my love inparadiseth, + By interdicting me from her for ever. + I do not grieve that I am forced to die, + But die to think upon the reason why. + + +IV + + My tears are true. Though others be divine, + And sing of wars and Troy's new rising frame, + Meeting heroic feet in every line, + That tread high measures in the scene of fame, + And I, though disaccustoming my muse, + And sing but low songs in an humble vein, + May one day raise my style as others use, + And turn Elizon to a higher strain. + When re-intombing from oblivious ages + In better stanzas her surviving wonder, + I may opposed against the monster rage + That part desert and excellence asunder; + That she though coy may yet survive to see, + Her beauty's wonder lives again in me. + + +V + +_Conclusion of the whole_ + + Sometimes in verse I praised, sometimes in verse sighed; + No more shall pen with love and beauty mell, + But to my heart alone my heart shall tell + How unseen flames do burn it day and night, + Lest flames give light, light bring my love to sight, + And my love prove my folly to excel. + Wherefore my love burns like the fire of hell, + Wherein is fire and yet there is no light; + For if one never loved like me, then why + Skill-less blames he the thing he doth not know? + And he that so hath loved should favour show, + For he hath been a fool as well as I. + Thus shall henceforth more pain, more folly have; + And folly past, may justly pardon crave. + + +A CALCULATION UPON THE BIRTH OF AN HONOURABLE LADY'S DAUGHTER, BORN IN +THE YEAR 1588 AND ON A FRIDAY + + Fair by inheritance, whom born we see + Both in the wondrous year and on the day + Wherein the fairest planet beareth sway, + The heavens to thee this fortune doth decree! + Thou of a world of hearts in time shall be + A monarch great, and with one beauty's ray + So many hosts of hearts thy face shall slay, + As all the rest for love shall yield to thee, + But even as Alexander when he knew + His father's conquests wept, lest he should leave + No kingdom unto him for to subdue: + So shall thy mother thee of praise bereave; + So many hearts already she hath slain, + As few behind to conquer shall remain. + + +SONNETS FROM THE MANUSCRIPT EDITION, NOT FOUND IN THAT OF 1594 + +I + +_Of the sudden surprising of his heart, and how unawares he was caught_ + + Delight in your bright eyes my death did breed, + As light and glittering weapons babes allure + To play with fire and sword, and so procure + Then to be burnt and hurt ere they take heed, + Thy beauty so hath made me burn and bleed; + Yet shall my ashes and my blood assure + Thy beauty's fame forever to endure; + For thy fame's life from my death doth proceed; + Because my heart to ashes burned giveth + Life to thy fame, thou right a phoenix art, + And like a pelican thy beauty liveth + By sucking blood out of my breast and heart. + Lo why with wonder we may thee compare + Unto the pelican and phoenix rare! + + +II + +_An exhortation to the reader to come and see his mistress's beauty_ + + Eyes curious to behold what nature can create, + Come see, come see, and write what wonder you do see, + Causing by true report our next posterity + Curse fortune for that they were born too late! + Come then and come ye all, come soon lest that + The time should be too short and men too few should be; + For all be few to write her least part's history, + Though they should ever write and never write but that. + Millions look on her eyes, millions think on her wit, + Millions speak of her, millions write of her hand. + The whole eye on the lip I do not understand; + Millions too few to praise but some one part of it, + As either of her eye or lip or hand to write, + The light or black, the taste or red, the soft or white. + + +III + +_Of the excellency of his lady's voice_ + + Lady of ladies, the delight alone + For which to heaven earth doth no envy bear; + Seeing and hearing thee, we see and hear + Such voice, such light, as never sung nor shone. + The want of heaven I grant yet we may moan, + Not for the pleasure of the angels there, + As though in face or voice they like thee were, + But that they many be, and thou but one. + The basest notes which from thy voice proceed, + The treble of the angels do exceed, + So that I fear their choir to beautify, + Lest thou to some in heaven shall sing and shine. + Lo, when I hear thee sing, the reason why + Sighs of my breast keep time with notes of thine! + + +IV + +_Of her excellency both in singing and instruments_ + + Not that thy hand is soft, is sweet, is white, + Thy lips sweet roses, breast sweet lily is, + That love esteems these three the chiefest bliss + Which nature ever made for lips' delight; + But when these three to show their heavenly might + Such wonders do, devotion then for this + Commandeth us with humble zeal to kiss + Such things as work miracles in our sight. + A lute of senseless wood, by nature dumb, + Touched by thy hand doth speak divinely well; + And from thy lips and breast sweet tunes do come + To my dead heart, the which new life do give. + Of greater wonders heard we never tell + Than for the dumb to speak, the dead to live. + + +V + +_Of the envy others bear to his lady for the former perfections_ + + When beauty to the world vouchsafes this bliss, + To show the one whose other there is not, + The whitest skins red blushing shame doth blot, + And in the reddest cheeks pale envy is. + The fair and foul come thus alike by this; + For when the sun hath our horizon got, + Venus herself doth shine no more, God wot, + Than the least star that takes the light from his. + The poor in beauty thus content remain + To see their jealous cause revenged in thee, + And their fair foes afflicted with like pain. + Lo, the clear proof of thy divinity; + For unto God is only due this praise + The highest to pluck down, the low to raise! + + +VI + +_To his mistress, upon occasion of a Petrarch he gave her, showing her +the reason why the Italian commenters dissent so much in the exposition +thereof_ + + Miracle of the world! I never will deny + That former poets praise the beauty of their days; + But all those beauties were but figures of thy praise, + And all those poets did of thee but prophesy. + Thy coming to the world hath taught us to descry + What Petrarch's Laura meant, for truth the lip bewrays. + Lo, why th' Italians, yet which never saw thy rays, + To find out Petrarch's sense such forged glosses try! + The beauties which he in a veil enclosed beheld + But revelations were within his surest heart + By which in parables thy coming he foretold; + His songs were hymns of thee, which only now before + Thy image should be sung; for thou that goddess art + Which only we without idolatry adore. + + +VII + +_Complaint of misfortune in love only_ + + Now, now I love indeed, and suffer more + In one day now then I did in a year; + Great flames they be which but small sparkles were, + And wounded now, I was but pricked before. + No marvel then, though more than heretofore + I weep and sigh; how can great wounds be there + Where moisture runs not out? and ever, where + The fire is great, of smoke there must be store. + My heart was hitherto but like green wood, + Which must be dried before it will burn bright; + My former love served but my heart to dry; + Now Cupid for his fire doth find it good: + For now it burneth clear, and shall give light + For all the world your beauty to espy. + + +VIII + +_Complaint of his lady's melancholiness_ + + If that one care had our two hearts possessed, + Or you once (felt) what I long suffered, + Then should thy heart accuse in my heart's stead + The rigour of itself for mine unrest. + Then should thine arm upon my shoulder rest, + And weight of grief sway down thy troubled head; + Then should thy tears upon my sheet be shed, + And then thy heart should pant upon my breast. + But when that other cares thy heart do seize, + Alas, what succour gain I then by this, + But double grief for thine and mine unease? + Yet when thou see'st thy hurts to wound my heart, + And so art taught by me what pity is, + Perhaps thy heart will learn to feel my smart. + + +IX + + Dear, though from me your gratious looks depart, + And of that comfort do myself bereave, + Which both I did deserve and did receive, + Triumph not over much in this my smart. + Nay, rather they which now enjoy thy heart + For fear just cause of mourning should conceive, + Lest thou inconstant shouldst their trust deceive + Which like unto the weather changing art. + For in foul weather birds sing often will + In hope of fair, and in fair time will cease, + For fear fair time should not continue still; + So they may mourn which have thy heart possessed + For fear of change, and hope of change may ease + Their hearts whom grief of change doth now molest. + + +X + + If ever any justly might complain + Of unrequited service, it is I; + Change is the thanks I have for loyalty, + And only her reward is her disdain; + So as just spite did almost me constrain, + Through torment her due praises to deny, + For he which vexed is with injury + By speaking ill doth ease his heart of pain. + But what, shall torture make me wrong her name? + No, no, a pris'ner constant thinks it shame, + Though he (were) racked his first truth to gainsay. + Her true given praise my first confession is; + Though her disdain do rack me night and day, + This I confessed, and will deny in this. + + +Printed by BALLANTYNE, HANSON & CO. 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