XXVIII



How can I then return in happy plight,

That am debarre'd the benefit of rest?

When day's oppression is not eas'd by night,

But day by night and night by day oppress'd,

And each, though enemies to either's reign,

Do in consent shake hands to torture me,

The one by toil, the other to complain

How far I toil, still farther off from thee. 

I tell the day, to please him thou art bright,

And dost him grace when clouds do blot the heaven:

So flatter I the swart-complexion'd night,

When sparkling stars twire not thou gild'st the even.

  But day doth daily draw my sorrows longer,

  And night doth nightly make grief's length seem stronger.

 	--William Shakespeare

VI



Then let not winter's ragged hand deface,

In thee thy summer, ere thou be distill'd:

Make sweet some vial; treasure thou some place

With beauty's treasure ere it be self-kill'd.

That use is not forbidden usury,

Which happies those that pay the willing loan;

That's for thy self to breed another thee,

Or ten times happier, be it ten for one;

Ten times thy self were happier than thou art,

If ten of thine ten times refigur'd thee:

Then what could death do if thou shouldst depart,

Leaving thee living in posterity?

  Be not self-will'd, for thou art much too fair

  To be death's conquest and make worms thine heir.

 	--William Shakespeare