But, soft! enough, too much, I fear;
Lest that my mistress hear my song,
She will not stick to round me i' the ear,
To teach my tongue to be so long:

Yet will she blush, here be it said,
To hear her secrets so bewray'd.

[xx.]

Live with me, and be my love,
And we will all the pleasures prove
That hills and valleys, dales and fields,
And all the craggy mountains yields.
There will we sit upon the rocks,
And see the shepherds feed their flocks,
By shallow rivers, by whose falls
Melodious birds sing madrigals.

There will I make thee a bed of roses,
With a thousand fragrant posies,
A cap of flowers, and a kirtle
Embroider'd all with leaves of myrtle.

A belt of straw and ivy buds,

With coral clasps and amber studs ; And if these pleasures may thee move. Then live with me and be my love.

LOVE'S ANSWER.

350

360

And there sung the dolefull'st ditty, That to hear it was great pity:

390

Fie, fie, fie,' now would she cry;
'Tereu, tereu!' by and by ;
That to hear her so complain,
Scarce I could from tears refrain ;
For her griefs, so lively shown,
Made me think upon mine own.
Ah, thought I, thou mourn'st in vain!
None takes pity on thy pain :
Senseless trees they cannot hear thee;
Ruthless beasts they will not cheer thee
King Pandion he is dead;

All thy friends are lapp'd in lead;
All thy fellow birds do sing,
Careless of thy sorrowing.
'Even so, poor bird, like thee,
None alive will pity me.
Whilst as fickle Fortune smiled,
Thou and I were both beguiled.

Every one that flatters thee
Is no friend in misery.

Words are easy, like the wind;
Faithful friends are hard to find:

Every man will be thy friend

Whilst thou hast wherewith to spend ; But if store of crowns be scant,

No man will supply thy want.

If that one be prodigal,
Bountiful they will him call,
And with such-like flattering,
'Pity but he were a king ;
If he be addict to vice,
Quickly him they will entice;
If to women he be bent,
They have at commandement:
But if Fortune once do frown,
Then farewell his great renown;
They that fawn'd on him before
Use his company no more.
He that is thy friend indeed,
He will help thee in thy need:
If thou sorrow, he will weep;
If thou wake, he cannot sleep;
Thus of every grief in heart
He with thee doth bear a part.
These are certain signs to know
Faithful friend from flattering foe.

400

410

420

430

Unthrifty loveliness, why dost thou spend
Upon thyself thy beauty's legacy ?

Nature's bequest gives nothing but doth lend,
And being frank she lends to those are free.
Then, beauteous niggard, why dost thou abuse
The bounteous largess given thee to give?
Profitless usurer, why dost thou use
So great a sum of sums, yet canst not live?
For having traffic with thyself alone,
Thou of thyself thy sweet self dost deceive.
Then how, when nature calls thee to be gone,
What acceptable audit canst thou leave?

Thy unused beauty must be tomb'd with thee,

Which, used, lives th' executor to be.

V.

Those hours, that with gentle work did frame The lovely gaze where every eye doth dwell,

Will play the tyrants to the very same
And that unfair which fairly doth excel;
For never-resting time leads summer on
To hideous winter and confounds him there;
Sap check'd with frost and lusty leaves quite
gone,

Beauty o'ersnow'd and bareness every where
Then, were not summer's distillation left,
A liquid prisoner pent in walls of glass,
Beauty's effect with beauty were bereft,
Nor it nor no remembrance what it was:
But flowers distill'd, though they with
winter meet,

Leese but their show; their substance still lives sweet.

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 thyself to breed another thee,
Or ten times happier, be it ten for one;
Ten times thyself were happier than thou art,
If ten of thine ten times refigured 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.

In singleness the parts that thou shouldst bear.

Mark how one string, sweet husband to another,

Strikes each in each by mutual ordering, Resembling sire and child and happy mother Who all in one, one pleasing note do sing: Whose speechless song, being many, seeming one,

Sings this to thee: 'thou single wilt prove

none.

IX.

Is it for fear to wet a widow's eye
That thou consumest thyself in single life?
Ah! if thou issueless shalt hap to die,
The world will wail thee, like a makeless
wife ;

The world will be thy widow and still weep
That thou no form of thee hast left behind,
When every private widow well may keep
By children's eyes her husband's shape in
mind.

Look, what an unthrift in the world doth spend

Shifts but his place, for still the world enjoys it;

But beauty's waste hath in the world an end, And kept unused, the user so destroys it.

No love toward others in that bosom sits That on himself such murderous shame commits.

For shame! deny that thou bear'st love to any,

Who for thyself art so unprovident.
Grant, if thou wilt, thou art beloved of many,
But that thou none lovest is most evident;
For thou art so possess'd with murderous hate
That 'gainst thyself thou stick'st not to con-
spire,

Seeking that beauteous roof to ruinate
Which to repair should be thy chief desire.
O, change thy thought, that I may change
my mind!

Shall hate be fairer lodged than gentle love?
Be, as thy presence is, gracious and kind,
Or to thyself at least kind-hearted prove:
Make thee another self, for love of me,
That beauty still may live in thine or thee.

XI.

As fast as thou shalt wane, so fast thou grow

est

In one of thine, from that which thou departest;

And that fresh blood which youngly thou bestowest

Thou mayst call thine when thou from youth

convertest.

Herein lives wisdom, beauty and increase: Without this, folly, age and cold decay

If all were minded so, the times should cease And threescore year would make the world away.

Let those whom Nature hath not made for store,

Harsh featureless and rude, barrenly perish: Look, whom she best endow'd she gave the more;

Which bounteous gift thou shouldst in bounty cherish :

She carved thee for her seal, and meant thereby

Thou shouldst print more, not let that copy die.

XII.

When I do count the clock that tells the time,
And see the brave day sunk in hideous night;
When I behold the violet past prime,
And sable curls all silver'd o'er with white;
When lofty trees I see barren of leaves
Which erst from heat did canopy the herd,
And summer's green all girded up in sheaves
Borne on the bier with white and bristly
beard,

Then of thy beauty do I question make,
That thou among the wastes of time must go,
Since sweets and beauties do themselves for-
sake

And die as fast as they see others grow;

And nothing 'gainst Time's scythe can make defence

Save breed, to brave him when he takes thee hence.

XIII.

O, that you were yourself! but, love, you are
No longer yours than you yourself here live :
Against this coming end you should prepare,
And your sweet semblance to some other
give.
[lease

So should that beauty which you hold in
Find no determination: then you were
Yourself again after yourself's decease,
When your sweet issue your sweet form
should bear.

Who lets so fair a house fall to decay,
Which husbandry in honor might uphold
Against the stormy gusts of winter's day
And barren rage of death's eternal cold?
O, none but unthrifts! Dear my love, you
know

You had a father: let your son say so.

XIV.

Not from the stars do I my judgment pluck;
And yet methinks I have astronomy,
But not to tell of good or evil luck,
Of plagues, of dearths, or seasons' quality;
Nor can I fortune to brief minutes tell,
Pointing to each his thunder, rain and wind,
Or say with princes if it shall go well,
By oft predict that I in heaven find:
But from thine eyes my knowledge I derive,
And, constant stars, in them I read such art
As truth and beauty shall together thrive,
If from thyself to store thou wouldst convert;
Or else of thee this I prognosticate :

Thy end is truth's and beauty's doom and date

But wherefore do not you a mightier way
Make was upon this bloody tyrant, Time?
And fortify yourself in your decay
With means more blessed than my barren
rhyme ?

Now stand you on the top of happy hours,
And many maiden gardens yet unset
With virtuous wish would bear your living
flowers,

Much liker than your painted counterfeit :
So should the lines of life that life repair,
Which this, Time's pencil, or my pupil pen,
Neither in inward worth nor outward fair,
Can make you live yourself in eyes of men.

To give away yourself keeps yourself still, And you must live, drawn by your own sweet skill.

And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;'
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course un-
trimm'd. ,

But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his
shade,

When in eternal lines to time thou growest :
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this and this gives life to thee.

Nor draw no lines there with thine antique pen;

Him in thy course untainted do allow
For beauty's pattern to succeeding men.

Yet, do thy worst, old Time: despite thy wrong,

My love shall in my verse ever live young.

XX.

A woman's face with Nature's own hand painted

Hast thou, the master-mistress of my passion; A woman's gentle heart, but not acquainted With shifting change, as is false women's fashion;

An eye more bright than theirs, less false in rolling,

Gilding the object whereupon it gazeth;
A man in hue, all 'hues' in his controlling,
Which steals men's eyes and women's souls
amazeth.

And for a woman wert thou first created;
Till Nature, as she wrought thee, fell a-dot-
ing,

And by addition me of thee defeated,

By adding one thing to my purpose nothing. But since she prick'd thee out for women's