In pride of wit, when high desire of fame Gave life and courage to my labouring

pen,

And first the sound and virtue of my

name

Won grace and credit in the ears of men; With those, the thronged theatres that

press,

I in the circuit for the laurel strove, Where the full praise, I freely must confess, In heat of blood, a modest mind might

move.

With shouts and claps at every little

pause,

When the proud round on every side hath

rung,

Sadly I sit, unmoved with the applause, As though to me it nothing did belong. No public glory vainly I pursue,

All that I seek is to eternize you.

Sonnet 49

Thou leaden brain, which censur'st what I write,

And sayst my lines be dull, and do not

move,

I marvel not thou feelst not my delight, Which never felt'st my fiery touch of love. But thou, whose pen hath like a packhorse served,

Whose stomach unto gall hath turned thy food,

Whose senses, like poor prisoners, hungerstarved,

Whose grief hath parched thy body, dried thy blood:

Thou which hast scorned life, and hated death,

And, in a moment, mad, sober, glad, and

sorry;

Thou which hast banned thy thoughts, and cursed thy birth,

With thousand plagues more than in purgatory:

Thou, thus whose spirit Love in his fire refines,

Come thou and read, admire, applaud my lines.

When like an eaglet I first found my love,
For that the virtue I thereof would know,
Upon the nest I set it forth, to prove
If it were of that kingly kind or no:
But it no sooner saw my sun appear,
But on her rays with open eyes it stood,
To show that I had hatched it for the air,
And rightly came from that brave-mount-
ing brood.

And, when the plumes were summed with sweet desire

To prove the pinions, it ascends the skies; Do what I could, it need'sly would aspire To my soul's sun, those two celestial eyes. Thus from my breast, where it was bred alone,

It after thee is like an eaglet flown.

Sonnet 59

As Love and I late harboured in one inn, With proverbs thus each other entertain: In love there is no lack, thus I begin; Fair words make fools, replieth he again: Who spares to speak doth spare to speed, quoth I;

As well, saith he, too forward as too slow: Fortune assists the boldest, I reply;

A hasty man, quoth he, ne'er wanted woe: Labour is light where love, quoth I, doth pay;

Saith he, Light burden's heavy, if far

borne:

Quoth I, the main lost, cast the bye away: You have spun a fair thread, he replies in

scorn.

And having thus awhile each other thwarted,

Fools as we met, so fools again we parted.

Since there's no help, come, let us kiss and

part.

Nay, I have done, you get no more of me, And I am glad, yea, glad with all my heart,

That thus so cleanly I myself can free. Shake hands for ever, cancel all our

Vows,

And when we meet at any time again, Be it not seen in either of our brows That we one jot of former love retain. Now at the last gasp of Love's latest breath,

When, his pulse failing, Passion speechless lies,

When Faith is kneeling by his bed of death,

And Innocence is closing up his eyes, Now, if thou wouldst, when all have given him over,

From death to life thou might'st him

yet recover.