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CXXIV



If my dear love were but the child of state,

It might for Fortune\'s bastard be unfather\'d,

As subject to Time\'s love or to Time\'s hate,

Weeds among weeds, or flowers with flowers gather\'d.

No, it was builded far from accident;

It suffers not in smiling pomp, nor falls

Under the blow of thralled discontent,

Whereto th\' inviting time our fashion calls:

It fears not policy, that heretic,

Which works on leases of short-number\'d hours,

But all alone stands hugely politic, 

That it nor grows with heat, nor drowns with showers.

  To this I witness call the fools of time,

  Which die for goodness, who have lived for crime.

 	--William Shakespeare

CXXXIII



How oft when thou, my music, music play\'st,

Upon that blessed wood whose motion sounds

With thy sweet fingers when thou gently sway\'st

The wiry concord that mine ear confounds,

Do I envy those jacks that nimble leap,

To kiss the tender inward of thy hand,

Whilst my poor lips which should that harvest reap,

At the wood\'s boldness by thee blushing stand!

To be so tickled, they would change their state 

And situation with those dancing chips,

O\'er whom thy fingers walk with gentle gait,

Making dead wood more bless\'d than living lips.

  Since saucy jacks so happy are in this,

  Give them thy fingers, me thy lips to kiss.

 	--William Shakespeare

XCI



Some glory in their birth, some in their skill,

Some in their wealth, some in their body\'s force,

Some in their garments though new-fangled ill;

Some in their hawks and hounds, some in their horse;

And every humour hath his adjunct pleasure,

Wherein it finds a joy above the rest:

But these particulars are not my measure,

All these I better in one general best.

Thy love is better than high birth to me,

Richer than wealth, prouder than garments\' costs,

Of more delight than hawks and horses be;

And having thee, of all men\'s pride I boast:

  Wretched in this alone, that thou mayst take

  All this away, and me most wretchcd make.

 	--William Shakespeare