ILLUSTRATION OF THE SONNETS. O no! thy love, though much, is not so great ; For thee watch I, whilst thou dost wake elsewhere When most I wink, then do mine eyes best see, All days are nights to see, till I see thee, And nights, bright days, when dreams do show thee me.-43. If the dull substance of my flesh were thought, The other two, slight air and purging fire, -44. My life, being made of four, with two alone, By those swift messengers return'd from thee, Of thy fair health, recounting it to me: This told, I joy; but then no longer glad, I send them back again, and straight grow sad.—45. The transpositions we have made in the arrangement are justified by the considera tion that in the original text the 50th, 51st, and 52nd Sonnets are entirely isolated; that the 27th and 28th are also perfectly unconnected with what precedes and what follows; that the 61st stands equally alone; and that the 43rd, 44th, and 45th are in a similar position. We have now a perfect little poem describing the journeythe restless pilgrimage of thought-the desire for return. The thoughts of a temporary separation lead to the fear that absence may produce estrangement : How careful was I, when I took my way, Each trifle under truest bars to thrust, That, to my use, it might unused stay From hands of falsehood, in sure wards of trust! Art left the prey of every vulgar thief. From whence at pleasure thou mayst come and part; For truth proves thievish for a prize so dear.-48. The sentiment is somewhat differently repeated in a Sonnet which is entirely isolated in the place where it stands in the original : So are you to my thoughts, as food to life, Or as sweet-season'd showers are to the ground; As 'twixt a miser and his wealth is found: Now proud as an enjoyer, and anon Doubting the filching age will steal his treasure; Then better'd that the world may see my pleasure: Save what is had or must from you be took. Thus do I pine and surfeit day by day, But the 49th Sonnet carries forward the dread expressed in the 48th that his friend will be stolen," into the apprehension that coldness, and neglect, and desertion may one day ensue : Against that time, if ever that time come, Against that time do I ensconce me here To leave poor me thou hast the strength of laws, This Sonnet is also completely isolated; but much further on, according to the original arrangement, we find the idea here conveyed of that self-sacrificing humility which will endure unkindness without complaint, worked out with exquisite tenderness : When thou shalt be dispos'd to set me light, And prove thee virtuous, though thou art forsworn. Of faults conceal'd, wherein I am attainted; For bending all my loving thoughts on thee, Doing thee vantage, double-vantage me. Such is my love, to thee I so belong, That for thy right myself will bear all wrong.-88. Say that thou didst forsake me for some fault, And I will comment upon that offence: Speak of my lameness, and I straight will halt; For thee, against myself I'll vow debate, For I must ne'er love him whom thou dost hate.-89. Then hate me when thou wilt; if ever, now; Now, while the world is bent my deeds to cross, Join with the spite of fortune, make me bow, And do not drop in for an after loss: Ah! do not, when my heart hath scap'd this sorrow, If thou wilt leave me, do not leave me last, But in the onset come; so shall I taste At first the very worst of fortune's might; And other strains of woe, which now seem woe, Some glory in their birth, some in their skill, Richer than wealth, prouder than garments' cost, All this away, and me most wretched make.-91. But do thy worst to steal thyself away, For term of life thou art assured mine; Happy to have thy love, happy to die! But what's so blessed-fair that fears no blot?— So shall I live, supposing thou art true, Is writ, in moods and frowns and wrinkles strange; That in thy face sweet love should ever dwell; If thy sweet virtue answer not thy show!-93. Separated from the preceding stanzas by three Sonnets, the 94th, 95th, and 96th, which we have already given-(they are those in which a friend is mildly upbraided for the defects in his character)-we have a second little poem on Absence. It would be difficult to find anything more perfect in our own or any other lan guage: How like a winter hath my absence been From thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year! Or, if they sing, 't is with so dull a cheer, That leaves look pale, dreading the winter's near.-97. From you have I been absent in the spring, When proud-pied April, dress'd in all his trim, Hath put a spirit of youth in everything, That heavy Saturn laugh'd and leap'd with him. Yet nor the lays of birds, nor the sweet smell Of different flowers in odour and in hue, Could make me any summer's story tell, Or from their proud lap pluck them where they grew : Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose; Yet seem'd it winter still, and, you away, As with your shadow I with these did play :-98. The forward violet thus did I chide : Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet that smells, If not from my love's breath? The purple pride Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells, In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dy'd. The lily I condemned for thy hand, A vengeful canker eat him up to death. More flowers I noted, yet I none could see, But sweet or colour it had stolen from thee.-99. But this poem is quite unconnected with what precedes it. It is placed where it is upon no principle of continuity. Are we then to infer that the friend whose is the person who is immediately "shame" is "like a canker in the budding rose afterwards addressed as one from whom every flower had stolen "sweet or colour?' |