10.2.1. Tables I-VIII

William Shake-speare

Richard Barnfield (1594-95)

V&A, 125 f.

These blue-vein'd violets whereon we lean

Never can blab, nor know not what we mean.

AS I, St. 30

There grows the Gilliflower, the Mint, the Daizy
(Both red and white,) the blew-vein'd-Violet:

V&A, 359 f.

And all this dumb play had his acts made plain

With tears, which chorus-like her eyes did rain.

C/Cass

Thus ended shee; and then her tears began

That (chorus-like) at every word down rained.

Which like a paire of christall fountaines ran, Along her lovely cheeks.

V&A, 535-538

'Now let me say good night, and so say you;

If you will say so, you shall have a kiss.'

'Good night,' quoth she; and ere he says adieu,

The honey fee of parting tender'd is:

AS I, St. 16

O would to God (so I might have my fee)

My lips were honey, and thy mouth a Bee.

V&A, 157 ff.

11

Is thine own heart to thine own face affected? ... Narcissus so himself himself forsook

Nature that made thee with herself at strife

AS/SD, St. 44

Be not too much of thine own Image doting:

So fair Narcissus   lost his love and life.

(Beauty is often with itself at strife).

V&A, 815 f.

Look, how a bright star shooteth from the sky,

So glides he in the night fro m Venus' eye...

Whereat amaz'd...

C/Cass

Look how a brightsome Planet in the sky, (Spangling the Welkin with a golden spot)

Shoots suddenly from the beholders eye

And leaves him looking there where she is not: Even so amazed Phoebus ...

V&A, 592

And on his neck her yoking arms she throws

C/Cass

This said : he sweetly doth imbrace his love,

Yoaking his arms about her Ivory neck:

And calls her wanton Venus milk-white Dove

RL, 125-126

And every one to rest himself betakes,

Save thieves, and cares

C/Cass

Now silent night drew on; when all things sleep,

Save theeves, and cares; and now stil mid-night came

15

When I consider every thing that grows

Holds in perfection but a little moment,

That this huge stage presenteth nought but shows

Whereon the stars in secret influence comment;

When I perceive that men as plants increase

AS I. 46

For if we do consider of each thing
That flies in welkin, or in water swims,
How every thing increaseth with the Spring,
And how the blacker still the brighter dims

20

But since she pricked thee out for women's pleasure,

Mine be thy love and thy love's use their treasure.

AS I. 35

I love thee for thy gifts, She for her pleasure;
I for thy Vertue, She for Beauty's treasure.

21

6

my love is as fair

As any mother's child, though not so bright

As those gold candles fixed in heaven's air:

treasure thou some place

With beauty's treasure ere it be self-killed

AS II.25

AS/Ded

C/S 4

Oh lend thine ivory forehead for Love's book,
Thine eyes for candles to behold the same...

Fair lovely Lady, w hose angelic eyes
Are Vestal candles of sweet beauty's treasure

Two stars there are in one fair firmament,

(Of some entitled Ganymede's sweet face)

53

106

21

Describe Adonis and the counterfeit

Is poorly imitated after you

I see their antique Pen would have expressed

Even such a beauty as you master now...

They had not skill enough your worth to sing:

For we which now behold these present days,

Have eyes to wonder, but lack tongues to praise.

Let them say more that like of hearsay well,

I will not praise that purpose not to sell.

C/S 17

C/S 12

Cherry-lipt Adonis in his snowy shape
Might not compare with his pure ivory white,
On whose fair front a Poet's pen may write

Some talk of Ganymede th' Idalian Boy,
And some of fair Adonis make their boast...
They speak by hear-say, I of perfect truth...
I only t'him have sacrifized my youth.
As for those wonders of antiquity...
They were (perhaps) less fair than Poets write,
But he is fairer then I can indite.

56

Sweet love renew thy force, be it not said

Thy edge should blunter be than appetite

GF, S 4

Either make thy self more witty:

Or again renew thy force:

68

Before the golden tresses of the dead

C/S 12

How term'st his golden tresses wav'd with air?

78

In others' works thou dost but mend the style

GF, S 5

Amend thy style who can: who can amend thy style?

85

130

My tongue-tied Muse in manners holds her still,

While comments of your praise richly compiled

Reserve your Character with golden quill

And precious phrase by all the Muses filed.

I have seen Roses damasked, red and white,

But no such Roses see I in her cheeks

C/Cass

And call's her wanton Venus milk-white Dove,

Whose ruddie lips the damaske roses decke.

And ever as his tongue compiles her praise,

Love daintie Dimples in her cheekes doth raise.

But he, supposing that she ment good-faith,

Her filed tongues temptations interceps

86

No, neither he, nor his compeers by night

Giving him aid, my verse astonished.

C/S 18

But neither he, nor all the Nymphs beside,
Can win my Ganymede, with them t'abide.

94

Lilies that fester, smell far worse than weeds.

AS II.39

Yea what more noisomer unto the smell
Than Lillies are?

95

Lucr.

836-40

O what a mansion have those vices got

My honey lost, and I, a drone-like bee,

Have no perfection of my summer left,

But robb'd and ransack'd by injurious theft:

In thy weak hive a wandering wasp hath crept,

And suck'd the honey which thy chaste bee kept.

C/S 17

His mouth a Hive, his tongue a hony-combe,
Where Muses (like Bees) make their mansion.

98-99

Nor did I wonder at the lily's white,

Nor praise the deep vermilion in the rose,

They were but sweet, but figures of delight:

Drawn after you, you pattern of all those.

The Roses fearfully on thorns did stand,

One blushing shame, another white despair:

A third nor red, nor white, had stol'n of both

AS I.3

His [Ganymede's] ivory-white and Alabaster skin
Is stain'd throughout with rare Vermillion red,
Whose twinkling starry lights do never blin
To shine on lovely Venus (Beauty's bed:)
But as the Lily and the blushing Rose,
So white and red on him in order grows.

144

To win me soon to hell my female evil

Tempteth my better angel from my side,

And would corrupt my saint to be a devil:

Wooing his purity with her foul pride.

AS/CC, St. 5

Thou dost entice the mind to doing evil,
Thou setst dissention twixt the man and wife;
A Saint in show, and yet indeed a devil:
Thou art the cause of euery common strife

William Shake-speare

Michael Drayton (1593-1599)

Venus and Adonis

Piers Gavestone (1593)

Or as love-nursing Venus when she sports,

With cherry-lipped Adonis in the shade,

Figuring her passions in a thousand sorts,

With sighs, and tears, or what else might persuade, Her dear, her sweet, her joy, her life, her love, Kissing his brow, his cheek, his hand, his glove.

2

When forty winters shall besiege thy brow,

And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field

The Shepheards Garland, Eclogue 2 (1593)

The time-plow'd furrows in thy fairest field.

38

Be thou the tenth Muse, ten times more in worth

Than those old nine which rhymers invocate,

And he that calls on thee, let him bring forth

Eternal numbers to outlive long date.

Idea's Mirror, Amour 8 (1594)

Unto the World, to Learning, and to Heauen,
Three nines there are, to everie one a nine;

...

Nine Worthy Women to the world were given.
My Worthy One to these Nine Worthies addeth,
And my fair Muse one Muse unto the Nine,
And my good Angel, in my soul divine,
With one more Order these Nine Orders gladdeth ;
  My Muse, my Worthy, and my Angel then
  Makes every One of these three Nines a Ten.

46

Mine eye and heart are at a mortal war,

How to divide the conquest of thy sight,

Mine eye, my heart thy picture's sight would bar,

My heart, mine eye the freedom of that right,

My heart doth plead that thou in him dost lie,

(A closet never pierced with crystal eyes)

But the defendant doth that plea deny,

And says in him thy fair appearance lies.

To 'cide this title is impanelled

A quest of thoughts, all tenants to the heart,

And by their verdict is determined

The clear eye's moiety, and the dear heart's part.

As thus, mine eye's due is thy outward part,

And my heart's right, thy inward love of heart.

Idea's Mirror, Amour 33 (1594)

Whilst thus mine eyes do surfeit with delight
My woeful heart, imprisoned in my breast,
Wishing to be transformd into my sight,
To looke on her by whom mine eyes are blest;
But whilst mine eyes thus greedily do gaze,
Behold! their objects over-soon depart,
And treading in this never-ending maze,
Wish now to be transformd into my heart:
My heart, surcharg'd with thoughts, sighs in abundance raise,
My eyes, made dim with looks, pour down a flood of tears;
And whilst my heart and eye envy each others praise,
My dying looks and thoughts are peis'd in equal fears:
And thus, whilst sighs and tears together do contend,
Each one of these doth aid unto the other lend.

Venus and Adonis, 291

His art with nature's workmanship at strife

Mortimeriados (1596)

Done for the last with such exceeding life,

As art therin and nature were at strife.

Lucrece, 1405-1407

In speech, it seem'd, his beard, all silver white,

Wagg'd up and down, and from his lips did fly

Thin winding breath, which purl'd up to the sky.

Mortimeriados (1596)

Whose streame an easie breath doth seem to blowe;

Which on the sparkling gravel runs in purles,

As though the waves had been of silver curles.

Lucrece, 1131-34

So I at each sad strain will strain a tear,

And with deep groans the diapason bear:

For burthen-wise I'll hum on Tarquin still,

While thou on Tereus descant'st better skill.

Idea's Mirror, Sonnet 9 (1599)

My hollow sighs the deepest base doe beare,

True diapazon in distincted sound:

My panting hart then treble makes the ayre,

And descants finely on the musiques ground.

134

So now I have confessed that he is thine,

And I myself am mortgaged to thy will,

Myself I'll forfeit, so that other mine

Thou wilt restore to be my comfort still.

But thou wilt not, nor he will not be free,

For thou art covetous, and he is kind,

He learned but surety-like to write for me

Under that bond that him as fast doth bind.

The statute of thy beauty thou wilt take,

Thou usurer that put'st forth all to use,

And sue a friend, came debtor for my sake,

So him I lose through my unkind abuse.

Him have I lost, thou hast both him and me,

He pays the whole, and yet am I not free.

Idea's Mirror, Sonnet 6 (1599)

Taking my pen, with words to cast my woe,
Duly to count the sum of all my cares,
I find my griefs innumerable grow,
The reckonings rise to millions of despairs ;
And thus dividing of my fatal hours,
The payments of my love I read and cross,
Subtracting, set my sweets unto my sours,
My joy's arrearage leads me to my loss ;
And thus mine eye's a debtor to thine eye,
Which by extortion gaineth all their looks ;
My heart hath paid such grievous usury
That all their wealth lies in thy beauty's books,
    And all is thine which hath been due to me,
    And I a bankrupt, quite undone by thee.

144

Two loves I have of comfort and despair,

Which like two spirits do suggest me still,

The better angel is a man right fair:

The worser spirit a woman coloured ill.

To win me soon to hell my female evil

Tempteth my better angel from my side,

And would corrupt my saint to be a devil:

Wooing his purity with her foul pride.

And whether that my angel be turned fiend,

Suspect I may, yet not directly tell,

But being both from me both to each friend,

I guess one angel in another's hell.

Yet this shall I ne'er know but live in doubt,

Till my bad angel fire my good one out.

Idea's Mirror, Sonnet 22 (1599)

An evil spirit, your beauty, haunts me still,
Wherewith, alas, I have been long possessed!
Which ceaseth not to tempt me to each ill,
Nor give me once but one poor minute's rest.
In me it speaks whether I sleep or wake;
And when by means to drive it out I try,
With greater torments then it me doth take,
And tortures me in most extremity.
Before my face it lays down my despairs,
And hastes me on unto a sudden death;
Now tempting me to drown myself in tears,
And then in sighing to give up my breath.
   Thus am I still provoked to every evil,
  By this good wicked spirit, sweet angel-devil.

81

Or I shall live your Epitaph to make,

Or you survive when I in earth am rotten,

From hence your memory death cannot take,

Although in me each part will be forgotten:

Your name from hence immortal life shall have,

Though I (once gone) to all the world must die;

The earth can yield me but a common grave,

When you entombed in men's eyes shall lie:

Your monument shall be my gentle verse,

Which eyes not yet created shall o'er-read,

And tongues to be, your being shall rehearse,

When all the breathers of this world are dead:

You still shall live (such virtue hath my Pen)

Where breath most breathes, even in the mouths of men.

68

Thus is his cheek the map of days outworn,

When beauty lived and died as flowers do now

Idea's Mirror, Sonnet 43 (1599)

Whilst thus my pen strives to eternize thee
Age rules my lines with wrinkles in my face,
Where in the map of all my misery
Is modelled out the world of my disgrace;

Whilst in despite of tyrannising times,
Medea-like, I make thee young again,
Proudly thou scorn'st my world-outwearing rhymes,
And murther'st virtue with thy coy disdain;
And though in youth my youth untimely perish,
To keep thee from oblivion and the grave,
Ensuing ages yet my rhymes shall cherish,
Where I entombed my better part shall save;
  And though this earthly body fade and die,
  My name shall mount upon eternity.

William Shake-speare

Barnabe Barnes (1593)

1

From fairest creatures we desire increase,

That thereby beauty's Rose might never die ...

Thou that art now the world's fresh ornament -

Sonnet 45

Sweet beauty's rose! in whose fair purple leaves,
Love's Queen in richest ornament doth lie -

7

Lo in the Orient when the gracious light ...

Unlooked on diest unless thou get a son.

33

Yet him for this, my love no whit disdaineth,

Suns of the world may stain, when heaven's sun staineth.

Sonnet 49

O sun, no son but most unkind stepfather -

19

Devouring time, blunt thou the Lion's paws,

And make the earth devour her own sweet brood

Yet do thy worst old Time: despite thy wrong,

My love shall in my verse ever live young.

Dedication to Northumberland

To your thrice noble house: which shall outwear

Devouring time itself -

Elegy 15

Yet (howsoever thou, with me shall deal)

Thy beauty shall persever in my verse.

77

Thy glass will show thee how thy beauties wear,

Thy dial how thy precious minutes waste,

These vacant leaves thy mind's imprint will bear,

And of this book this learning mayst thou taste.

The wrinkles which thy glass will truly show,

Of mouthed graves will give thee memory,

Thou by thy dial's shady stealth mayst know

Time's thievish progress to eternity.

Look what thy memory cannot contain,

Commit to these waste blanks, and thou shalt find

Those children nursed, delivered from thy brain,

To take a new acquaintance of thy mind.

These offices, so oft as thou wilt look,

Shall profit thee, and much enrich thy book.

Sonnet 56

The dial, love, which shows how my days spend,

The leaden plummets sliding to the ground,

My thoughts which to dark melancholy bend,

The rolling wheels, which turn swift hours round,

Thine eyes (Parthenophe) my fancies guide:

The watch continually which keeps his stroke,

By whose oft turning every hour doth slide,

Figure the sighs which from my liver smoke

Whose oft invasions finish my life's date:

The watchman which each quarter strikes the bell,

The love which doth each part examinate,

And in each quarter strikes his forces fell:

That hammer and great bell which ends each hour,

Death, my life's victor, sent by thy love's power.

80

O how I faint when I of you do write,

Knowing a better spirit doth use your name,

And in the praise thereof spends all his might,

To make me tongue-tied speaking of your fame.

But since your worth (wide as the Ocean is)

The humble as the proudest sail doth bear,

My saucy bark (inferior far to his)

On your broad main doth wilfully appear.

Your shallowest help will hold me up afloat,

Whilst he upon your soundless deep doth ride,

Or (being wrecked) I am a worthless boat,

He of tall building, and of goodly pride.

Then If he thrive and I be cast away,

The worst was this, my love was my decay.

Sonnet 91

These bitter gusts which vex my troubled seas,

And move with force my sorrow's floods to flow:

My fancy's ship tost here and there by these

Still floats in danger, ranging to and fro:

How fears my thoughts' swift pinnace thy hard rock,

Thine heart's hard rock, least thou mine heart (his pilot

Together with himself) should rashly knock,

And being quite dead-stricken, then should cry late,

 'Ah me!' too late to thy remorseless self.

Now when thy mercies all been banishèd

And blown upon thine hard rock's ruthless shelf,

My soul in sighs is spent and vanished,

Be pitiful, alas, and take remorse,

Thy beauty too much practiseth his force.

119

What potions have I drunk of Siren tears

Distilled from limbecks foul as hell within

Sonnet 49

A Siren, which within thy breast doth bathe her;
A fiend which doth in grace's garments graith her;
A fortress whose force is impregnable;
From my love's limbeck still still'd tears. O tears!

125

And take thou my oblation, poor but free,

Which is not mixed with seconds, knows no art,

But mutual render, only me for thee.

Hence, thou suborned informer, a true soul

When most impeached, stands least in thy control

Sonnet 15

Oh make exchange, sur render thine for mine,
Lest that my body, void of guide, be senseless.

Sonnet 4

Not yet content with him [Amor], sometimes, to toy;
But jealously kept, lest he should run from thee!
Whom thou in person guardest! (lest suborners
Should work his freelage, or in secret take him)

Sonnet 81

O kingly jealousy which canst admit

No thoughts of com-peers in thine high desire!

Provoker and maintainer of vain lies!

133

A torment thrice three-fold thus to be crossed:

Prison my heart in thy steel bosom's ward,

But then my friend's heart let my poor heart bail,

Whoe'er keeps me, let my heart be his guard,

Thou canst not then use rigour in my jail.

134

So now I have confessed that he is thine,

And I my self am mortgaged to thy will,

My self I'll forfeit, so that other mine,

Thou wilt restore to be my comfort still:

He learned but surety-like to write for me,

Under that bond that him as fist doth bind.

46

A quest of thoughts, all tenants to the heart -

87

The Charter of thy worth gives thee releasing:

My bonds in thee are all determinate.

117

Forgot upon your dearest love to call, Whereto all bonds do tie me day by day

142

....those lips of thine,

That have profaned their scarlet ornaments,

And sealed false bonds of love as oft as mine,

Robbed others' beds' revenues of their rents.

Sonnet 8

 'Why then' (said I) 'that mortgage must I show
Of your true-love which at your hands I got?'

Ay me, she was, and is his bail, I wot,

    But, when the mortgage should have cur'd the sore:
     She pass'd it off, by deed of gift before.

Sonnet 9

Nor any type of my poor heart's release

remains to me, how shall I take the seizure
Of her love's forfeiture -

Sonnet 11

When that thy trustless bonds were to be tried,

And when (through thy default) I thee did summon

Into the court of steadfast love, then cried

As it was promised, here stands his heart's bail:

And if in bonds to thee my love be tied,
Then by those bonds, take forfeit of the sale!

Sonnet 15

So shalt thou pawn to me sign for a sign
Of thy sweet conscience, when I shall resign
Thy love's large Charter, and thy bonds again.

Sonnet 16

Yet this delights, and makes me triumph much
That mine heart in her body lies imprisoned -

Sonnet 20

These eyes, thy beauty's tenants, pay due tears
For occupation of mine heart, thy free-hold:
In tenure of love's service (if thou behold)
With what exaction it is held through fears,
And yet thy rents, extorted, daily bears.

William Shake-speare

Christopher Marlowe, Hero and Leander (1593)

Sonnets, 9

But beauty's waste hath in the world an end,

And kept unused the user so destroys it:

I. 327-328

The richest corn dies if it be not reaped;

Beauty alone is lost, too warily kept -

Sonnets, 53

Describe Adonis and the counterfeit

Is poorly imitated after you;

On Helen's cheek all art of beauty set

And you in Grecian tires are painted new.

I.83-86

Some swore he was a maid in man's attire,

For in his looks were all that men desire,
A pleasant smiling cheek, a speaking eye,
A brow for love to banquet royally.

Sonnets, 70

That thou art blamed shall not be thy defect,

For slander's mark was ever yet the fair

I. 285-286

Whose name is it, if she be false or not
So she be fair, but some vile tongues will blot?

Sonnets, 80

But since your worth (wide as the Ocean is)

The humble as the proudest sail doth bear,

My saucy bark (inferior far to his)

On your broad main doth wilfully appear.

I. 225-226

A stately builded ship, well rigged and tall,
The ocean maketh more majestical.

Sonnets, 136

Among a number one is reckoned none;

Then in the number let me pass untold,

I. 255-256

One is no number; maids are nothing then
Without the sweet society of men.

Venus and Adonis, 3

Rose-cheek'd Adonis tried him to the chase;

I. 93

Rose-cheeked Adonis kept a solemn feast.

Venus and Adonis, 161-162

Narcissus so himself himself forsook,

And died to kiss his shadow in the brook.

I. 74-76

That leaped into the water for a kiss

Of his own shadow and, despising many,

Died ere he could enjoy the love of any.

Venus and Adonis, 263-270

The strong-neck'd steed, being tied unto a tree,

Breaketh his rein, and to her straight goes he.

Imperiously he leaps, he neighs, he bounds,

And now his woven girths he breaks asunder;

The bearing earth with his hard hoof he wounds -

Whose hollow womb resounds like heaven's thunder;

The iron bit he crusheth 'tween his teeth,

Controlling what he was controlled with.

II. 141-145

For as a hot proud horse highly disdains

To have his head controlled, but breaks the reins,

Spits forth the ringled bit, and with his hooves

Checks the submissive ground; so he that loves,

The more he is restrained, the worse he fares.

Venus and Adonis, 443-444

For from the stillitory of thy face excelling

Comes breath perfum'd that breedeth love by smelling.

I. 21-22

Many would praise the sweet smell as she passed,
When 'twas the odour which her breath forth cast;

Venus and Adonis, 473-474

For on the grass she lies as she were slain

Till his breath breatheth life in her again.

II. 1-3

By this, sad Hero, with love unacquainted,

Viewing Leander's face, fell down and fainted.

He kissed her and breathed life into her lips -

Venus and Adonis, 751

Therefore, despite of fruitless chastity -

I. 317

Abandon fruitless cold virginity -

Venus and Adonis, 947-948

Love's golden arrow at him shoull have fled,

And not Death's ebon dart, to strike him dead.

I. 161

Thence flew Love's arrow with the golden head,

And thus Leander was enamoured.

Venus and Adonis, 985-986

O hard-believing love! how strange it seems

Not to believe, and yet too credulous:

II. 221-222

(Love is too full of faith, too credulous,
With folly and false hope deluding us.)

Venus and Adonis, 1082

Nor sun nor wind will ever strive to kiss you:

I. 27-28

She ware no gloves; for neither sun nor wind
Would burn or parch her hands ...

The Rape of Lucrece, 407-413

Her breasts, like ivory globes circled with blue,

A pair of maiden worlds unconquered,

Save of their lord no bearing yoke they knew -

And him by oath they truly honoured.

These worlds in Tarquin new ambition bred;

Who, like a foul usurper, went about

From this fair throne to heave the owner out.

273-278

For though the rising ivory mount he scaled,
Which is with azure circling lines empaled,
Much like a globe (a globe may I term this,
By which love sails to regions full of bliss)
Yet there with Sisyphus he toiled in vain,
Till gentle parley did the truce obtain.

The Rape of Lucrece, 1079-1083

By this, lamenting Philomel had ended

The well-tun'd warble of her nightly sorrow,

And solemn night with slow sad gait descended

To ugly hell; when, lo! the blushing morrow

Lends light to all fair eyes that light will borrow:

327-334

By this, Apollo's golden harp began
To sound forth music to the ocean,
Which watchful Hesperus no sooner heard
But he the bright day-bearing car prepared
And ran before, as harbinger of light,
And with his flaring beams mocked ugly night,
Till she, o'ercome with anguish, shame, and rage,
Danged down to hell her loathsome carriage.

92.1

92.2

94

01

23

f. ed.

0

Wonder of these! Glory of other times!

1594

Shakespeare, 38

1

1

1

1

1

Unto the boundless ocean of thy beauty

1592

Petrarca, 1, 170

2

2

2

2

2

Go, wailing verse, the infants of my love

1591

Petarca, 217

3

3

3

3

3

If so it hap this offspring of my care

1591

Petrarca, 44

Shakespeare, 2

4

4

4

4

4

These plaintive verse, the posts of my desire

1592

Petrarca, 230, 293

5

5

5

5

5

Whilst youth and error led my wandering mind

1592

6

6

6

6

6

Fair is my love, and cruel as she's fair

1592

7

7

7

7

7

O had she not been fair and thus unkind

For had she not been fair and thus unkind

1592

8

8

8

8

8

Thou, poor heart, sacrificed unto the fairest

1592

Petrarca, 171

Shakespeare, 23

9

9

9

9

9

If this be love, to draw a weary breath

Then do I love and draw this weary breath

1591

Desportes, Diane I.29

10

10

10

10

10

O then love I, and draw this weary breath

1592

11

11

11

11

11

Tears, vows and prayers gain the hardest hearts

1591

12

12

12

12

12

My spotless love hovers with purest wings

1592

13

13

13

13

13

Behold what hap Pygmalion had to frame

1591

Shakespeare, 24

14

14

14

14

14

Those snary locks are those same nets, my dear

1591

Du Bellay, L'Olive 10

15

15

15

15

15

If that a loyal heart and faith unfeigned

1591

Petrarca, 224

Desportes, Diane, I.8

16

16

16

16

16

Happy in sleep, waking content to languish

1591

Petrarca, 212

17

17

17

Why should I sing in verse, why should I frame

1594

Petrarca, 70

17

17

18

18

18

Since the first look that led me to this error

1591

Petrarca, 171, 360

18

18

19

19

19

Restore thy tresses to the golden Ore

1591

Petrarca, 152, 220

Du Bellay, L'Olive 91

20

20

What it is to breathe and live without life

1601

Petrarca, 134

19

19

20

21

21

If Beauty thus be clouded with a frown

1591

Petrarca, 14

20

20

21

22

22

Come death the Anchor-holde of all my thoughts

Come Time, the anchor hold of my desire

1591

23

23

Time, cruel Time, come and subdue that brow

1601

Shakespeare, 19

21

21

22

24

24

These sorrowing sighs, the smokes of mine annoy

1591

22

22

23

25

25

False hope prolongs my ever certain grief

1592

Du Bellay, L'Olive 92

23

23

24

26

26

Look in my griefs, and blame me not to mourn

1591

24

24

27

Oft and in vain my rebel thoughts have ventur'd

1592

25

25

25

27

28

Raign in my thoughts, fair hand, sweet eye, rare voice

1591

26

26

26

28

29

Whilst by thy eyes pursued, my poor heart flew

1591

27

27

29

30

Still in the trace of my tormented thought

1592.2

Shakespeare, 142

28

28

30

31

Oft do I marvel whether DELIAS eyes

1592.2

Guarini, Rime, Deh dimmi Amor

29

32

Like as the spotless Ermelin distress'd

1592.2

30

33

My cares draw on mine everlasting night

1592.2

Petrarca, 331.55-59

27

31

29

31

34

The star of my mishap imposed this paining

1591

Tansillo, Amor m'impenna

Shakespeare, 87

30

32

35

And yet I cannot reprehend the flight

1594

Tansillo, Amor m'impenna

Edmund Spenser

28

32

31

33

36

Raising my hopes on hills of high desire

1591

Petrarca, 347

29

33

32

34

37

O why doth Delia credit so her glass

Why dost thou, Delia, credit so thy glass

1591

Petrarca 45-46

Tebaldeo, A che presti

Desportes, Hippolyte 18

30

34

33

35

38

I once may see when years shall wreck my wrong

1591

Tasso, Rime I.77

Desportes, Cléonice 62

31

35

34

36

39

Look, Delia, how w'esteem the half-blown Rose

1592

Tasso, Gerusalemme L. XVI, 14-15

32

36

35

37

40

But love whilst that thou mayst be loved again

1592

Tasso, Gerusalemme L. XVI, 14-15

33

37

36

38

41

When men shall find thy flower, thy glory pass

1592

Tasso, Rime I.77

34

38

37

39

42

When Winter snows upon thy golden hairs

When winter snows upon thy sable hairs

1592

Tasso, Rime I.77

Shakespeare, 81

35

39

38

40

43

Thou canst not die whilst any zeal abound

1592

Shakespeare, 81

36

40

39

41

44

O be not griev'd that these my papers

Be not displeased that these my papers

1592

Shakespeare, 18, 81

37

41

40

42

45

Delia, these eyes that so admireth thine

1592

Shakespeare, 64

38

42

41

43

46

Fair and lovely maid, look from the shore

Most fair and lovely maid, look from the shore

1592

39

43

42

44

47

Read in my face a volume of despairs

1592

Guarini, Quel Tempio, ove s'adora

Shakespeare, Lucrece 719-723; 1450-53

40

44

43

45

48

My Cynthia hath the waters of mine eyes

My Delia hath the waters of mine eyes

1591

41

45

44

46

49

How long shall I in mine affliction mourn

1592

42

46

45

47

50

Beauty, sweet love, is like the morning dew

1592

Shakespeare, Lucrece, 22-30

43

47

46

48

51

I must not grieve my Love, whose eyes would read

1592

47

49

52

O whither (poor forsaken) wilt thou go

1594

44

48

48

50

53

Drawn with th'attractive virtue of her eyes

1592

45

49

49

51

54

Care-charmer sleep, son of the Sable night

1592

Cariteo, Somno, d'ogni pensier placido oblio;

Desportes, Hippolyte 75

46

50

50

52

55

Let others sing of Knights and Palladines

1592

Shakespeare, 19, 63, 106

51

53

56

As to the Roman that would free his Land

1594

47

51

52

54

57

Like as the Lute that joys or else dislikes

Like as the lute delights or else dislikes

1592

48

52

53

55

58

None other fame mine unambitious Muse

1592

Shakespeare, 102

49

53

54

56

59

Unhappy pen and ill accepted papers

Unhappy pen, and ill-accepted lines

1592

Desportes, Cléonice 58

50

54

55

57

60

Lo here the impost of a faith unfaining

Lo here the impost of a faith entire

1591

William Shake-speare

Samuel Daniel

2

When forty winters shall besiege thy brow,

And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field

III (1592) [= 3 (1623)]

Delia herself and all the world may view;

Best in my face, how cares hath till'd deep furrows.

18

Nor shall Death brag thou wand'rest in his shade,

When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st.

XXXVI (1592) [= 44 (1623)]

Thou mayst in after ages live esteem'd,

Unburied in these lines reserv'd in pureness

19

Devouring time ...

But I forbid thee one most heinous crime,

O carve not with thy hours my love's fair brow

XXIII (1601) [= 23 (1623)]

Time, cruel Time, come and subdue that brow ...

Yet spare her, Time, let her exempted be,
She may become more kind to thee or me.

23

O let my looks be then the eloquence,

And dumb presagers of my speaking breast

Lucrece, 29-30

Beauty itself doth of itself persuade

The eyes of men without an orator.

VIII (1592) [=8 (1623)]

And you mine eyes, the agents of my heart,
Told the dumb message of my hidden grief

Rosamond, 1592, 129-130

Ah beauty Siren, fair enchanting good,

Sweet silent rhetoric of persuading eyes,

Dumb eloquence ...

24

Mine eye hath played the painter and hath stelled

Thy beauty's form in table of my heart;

XIII (1591) [= 13 (1623)]

For hapless, lo, even with mine own desires,

I figured on the table of my heart:
The fairest form, the worlde's eye admires

And so did perish by my proper art.

38

The pain be mine, but thine shall be the praise.

Dedication Poem (1594)

Whereof, the travail I may challenge mine;

But yet the glory, Madam! must be thine!

55

'Gainst death, and all-oblivious enmity

Shall you pace forth, your praise shall still find room,

Even in the eyes of all posterity

That wear this world out to the ending doom.

XXXVII (1592) [= 45 (1623)]

Though Time do spoil her of the fairest veil

That ever yet mortality did cover,

Which shall enstar the needle and the trail.

That grace, that virtue all that serv'd t'enwoman

Doth her unto eternity assummon.

64

When I have seen by time's fell hand defaced

The rich-proud cost of outworn buried age,

When sometime lofty towers I see down-rased,

And brass eternal slave to mortal rage.

XXXVII (1592) [= 45 (1623)]

Delia, these eyes that so admireth thine
Have seen those walls the which ambition rear'd
To check the world, how they entomb'd have lyen
Within themselves, and on them plows have ear'd.

81

Your name from hence immortal life shall have...

When you entombed in men's eyes shall lie:

Your monument shall be my gentle verse ...

When all the breathers of this world are dead:

You still shall live (such virtue hath my Pen)

Where breath most breathes, even in the mouths of men.

XXXIV (1592) [= 42 (1623)]

Then take this picture which I here present thee,
Limned with a pencil not all unworthy;
Here see the gifts that God and nature lent thee,
Here read thyself and what I suffered for thee.
This may remain thy lasting monument,
Which happily posterity may cherish

XXXV (1592) [= 43 (1623)]

Thou canst not die whilst any zeal abound

In feeling hearts than can conceive these lines ...

And if my pen could more enlarge thy name,

Then shouldst thou live in an immortal style.

XXXVI (1592) [= 44 (1623)]

Thou mayst in after ages live esteem'd,

Unburied in these lines reserv'd in pureness;

These shall entomb those eyes that have redeem'd

87

So thy great gift upon misprision growing,

Comes home again, on better judgement making.

XXVII (1591) [= 34 (1623)]

Down do I fall from off my high desiring ...
No pitying eye looks back upon my mourning.

102

That love is merchandized, whose rich esteeming

The owner's tongue doth publish every where.

XLVIII (1592) [= 58 (1623)]

For God forbid I should my papers blot,
With mercynary lines, with servile pen:

16

But wherefore do not you a mightier way

Make war upon this bloodytyrant time?

And fortify yourself in your decay

17

Who will believe my verse in time to come ...

The age to come would say, "this Poet lies,

Such heavenly touches ne'er touched earthly faces.

19

Devouring time ... And do whate'er thou wilt ...

But I forbid thee one most heinous crime,

O carve not with thy hours my love's fair brow -

63

.. when his youthful morn

Hath travelled on to Age's steepy night ...

For such a time do I now fortify

Against confounding Age's cruel knife ...

His beauty shall in these black lines be seen

106

When in the Chronicle of wasted time,

I see descriptions of the fairest wights,

And beauty making beautiful old rhyme,

In praise of Ladies dead, and lovely Knights ...

I see their antique Pen would have expressed

Even such a beauty as you master now.

So all their praises are but prophecies

Of this our time, all you prefiguring,

And for they looked but with divining eyes,

They had not skill enough your worth to sing:

XXX   ( 1591) [= 38 (1623)]

Then Beauty, now the burden of my song,
Whose glorious blaze the world doth so admire, 
Must yield up all to tyrant Time's desire ...

Go you, my verse, go tell her what she was

XXXVI   (1592) [= 44 (1623)]

Thou mayst in after ages live esteem'd,

Unburied in these lines reserv'd in pureness

XLVI (1592) [= 55 (1623)]

Let others sing of Knights and Paladines,

In aged accents and untimely words:

Paint shadows in imaginary lines

Which well the reach of their high wits records;

But I must sing of thee and those fair eyes,

Authentic shall my verse in time to come,

When yet th'unborn shall say, lo, where she lies,

Whose beauty made him speak that else was dumb.

These are the Arks, the Trophies I erect,

That fortify thy name against old age,

And these thy sacred virtues must protect

Against the Dark and time's consuming rage.

Though th'error of my youth they shall discover,
Suffice, they show I liv'd and was thy lover.

142

Love is my sin, and thy dear virtue hate,

Hate of my sin, grounded on sinful loving,

O but with mine compare thou thine own state

those lips of thine, / That have ...

sealed false bonds of love as oft as mine,

Robbed others' beds' revenues of their rents.

XXVII (1592.2) [= 30 (1623)]

Then judge who sins the greater of us twain:
I in my love, or thou in thy disdain.

Rosamond, ed. 1594, 755-756

And in uncleaness ever have been fed,
By the revenue of a wanton bed.

Venus and Adonis, 291

His art with nature's workmanship at strife

Rosamond, 1592, 373

So rare that Art did seem to strive with Nature.

Venus and Adonis, 727 ff.

'Now of this dark night I perceive the reason:

Cynthia for shame obscures her silver shine

Till forging Nature be condemn'd of treason,

For stealing moulds from heav'n that were divine

Rosamond, 1592, 141-144

Impiety of times, chastity's abater,
Falsehood, wherein thy self thy self deniest:
Treason, to counterfeit the seal of nature,
The stamp of heaven, impressed by the highest.

Lucrece, 22-30

O happiness enjoy'd but of a few!

And, if possess'd, as soon decay'd and done

As is the morning's silver-melting dew

Against the golden splendour of the sun;

An expir'd date, cancell'd ere well begun:

Honour and beauty, in the owner's arms,

Are weakly fortress'd from a world of harms.

Beauty itself doth of itself persuade

The eyes of men without an orator.

(395-396)

Cancell'd my fortunes, and enchained me

To endless date of never-ending woes?

(1729)

Life's lasting date from cancell'd destiny

Sonnet 42, 1592

Beauty, sweet love, is like the morning dew,
Whose short refresh upon the tender green,
Cheers for a time but till the Sun doth shew,
And straight 'tis gone as it had never been.

Rosamond, 1592, 120ff.

Ah beauty Siren, fair enchanting good,

Sweet silent rhetoric of persuading eyes,

Dumb eloquence ...

Rosamond, 1592, 242 ff.

And that thy beauty will be still admired:
But that those rays which all these flames do nourish,
Cancel'd with Time, will have their date expired

Rosamond, 1601, 99-102

There whereas frail and tender beauty stands,

With all assaulting powres environed;

Having but prayers and weak feeble hands

To hold their honour's Fort unvanquished

Sonnet 47(1601)

And that in beauty's lease expired appears

The date of age, the kalends of our death,--

Lucrece, 117-119

Till sable Night, mother of Dread and Fear

Upon the world dim darkness doth display,

And in her vaulty prison stows the day.

Rosamond, 1592, 439-441

Com'd was the Night (mother of Sleep and Fear)

Who with her sable mantlefriendly covers,
The sweet-stolne sports, of joyfull meeting Lovers.

Lucrece, 519-522

So thy surviving husband shall remain

The scornful mark of every open eye;

Thy kinsmen hang their heads at this disdain.

Thy issue blurr'd with nameless bastardy.

Rosamond,   1594, 760-762

The husband scorn'd, dishonoured the kin,

Parents disgrac'd, children infamous been,

Confus'd our race, and falsified our blood.

Lucrece, 589-595

'All which together, like a troubled ocean,

Beat at thy rocky and wrack-threatening heart,

To soften it with their continual motion;

For stones dissolv'd to water do convert.

O! if no harder than a stone thou art,

melt at my tears, and be compassionate;

Soft pity enters at an iron gate.

Sonnet 40 (1592)

Th' Ocean never did attend more duly,
Upon his Soverein's course, the nights pale Queen:
Nor paid the impost of his waves more truly,
Then mine to her in truth have ever been.
Yet nought the rock of that hard heart can move,
Where beat these tears with zeal, and fury driveth:

Lucrece, 719-723

Besides, his soul's fair temple is defac'd;

To whose weak ruins muster troops of cares,

To ask the spotted princess how she fares.

Sonnet 39 (1592)

Thus ruins she, to satisfy her will,
The Temple where her name was honoured still.

Lucrece, 1261

The precedent whereof in Lucrece view

Rosamond, 1592, 407

These presidents presenting to my view

Lucrece, 1450-53

In her [Hecuba] the painter had anatomiz'd

Time's ruin, beauty's wrack, and grim care's reign:

Her cheeks with chaps and wrinkles were disguis'd;

Of what she was no semblance did remain.

Sonnet 39 (1592)

Read in my face, a volume of despairs,
The wailing Iliads of my tragic woe;
Drawn with my blood, and painted with my cares,
Wrought by her hand, that I have honoured so.
Who whilst I burn, she sings at my soul's wrack.

Rosamond, 1592, 246-47

Read in my face the ruins of my youth,
The wrack of years upon my aged brow

Lucrece, 1583-85

But now the mindful messenger, come back,

Brings home his lord and other company;

Who finds his Lucrece clad in mourning black

Rosamond, 1594, 673

Condole thee here, clad all in black dispair,

With silence only, and a dying bed

Lucrece, 1660-1673

Lo! here the helpless merchant of this loss,

With head declin'd, and voice damm'd up with woe,

With sad-set eyes, and wretched arms across,

From lips new-waxen pale begins to blow

The grief away that stops his answer so:

But, wretched as he is, he strives in vain;

What he breathes out his breath drinks up again.

As through an arch the violent roaring tide

Outruns the eye that doth behold his haste,

Yet in the eddy boundeth in his pride

Back to the strait that forc'd him on so fast;

In rage sent out, recall'd in rage, being past:

Even so his sighs, his sorrows, make a saw,

To push grief on, and back the same grief draw.

(1779-1785)

The deep vexation of his inward soul

Hath serv'd a dumb arrest upon his tongue;

Who, mad that sorrow should his use control

Or keep him from heart-easing words so long,

Begins to talk; but through his lips do throng

Weak words so thick, come in his poor heart's aid,

That no man could distinguish what he said.

Rosamond, 1592, 624-637

Amaz'd he stands, nor voice nor body steers,
Words had no passage, tears no issue found:
For sorrow shut up words, wrath kept in tears,
Confus'd affects each other do confound:
Oppress'd with grief his passions had no bound:
Striving to tell his woes, words would not come;

For light cares speak, when mighty griefs are dumb.

At length extremity breaks out away,
Through which th'imprisoned voice with tears attended,
Wails out a sound that sorrows do bewray:
With arms across and eyes to heaven bended,
Vapouring out sighs that to the skies ascended.
Sighs, the poor ease calamity affords,
Which serve for speech when sorrow wanteth words.

Venus and Adonis, 63-66

She feedeth on the steam, as on a prey,

And calls it heavenly moisture, air of grace;

Wishing her cheeks were gardens full of flowers

So they were dewd with such distilling showers.

The Virgin Mary's Conception 

That growing shall distill the showers of grace

Venus and Adonis, 109-110

'Thus he that overrul'd I oversway'd,

Leading him prisoner in a red-rose chain.

Decease, Release 

It was no death to me, but to my woe ;

The bud was open'd to let out the rose,

The chains unloosed to let the captive go.

Venus and Adonis, 196

Thine eye darts forth the fire that burneth me

Loves Servile Lot

Her watery eyes have burning force,

Her floods and flames conspire;

...

Her loving looks are murdering darts

Venus and Adonis, 267-68

The bearing earth with his hard hoof he wounds,

Whose hollow womb resounds like heaven's thunder

A Vale of Tears

The hollow clouds full fraught with thund'ring groans,

With hideous thumps discharge their pregnant womb.

Venus and Adonis, 497-98

But now I liv'd, and life was death's annoy;

But now I died, and death was lively joy.

Decease, Release

My life my grief, my death hath wrought my joy ...

My speedy death hath scorned long annoy,

And loss of life and endless life assured.

Venus and Adonis, 511

sweet seals in my soft lips imprinted ...

(516)

Set thy seal-manual on my wax-red lips.

The Virgin Mary's Conception

thou seal'st a peace with bleeding kiss 

Venus and Adonis, 601-602

Even as poor birds, deceiv'd with painted grapes,

Do surfeit by the eye and pine the maw

Marie Magdalens Complaint

Painted meat no hunger feeds,

Dying life each death exceeds.

Venus and Adonis, 653-54

Distempering gentle Love in his desire,

As air and water do abate the fire.

S. Peters Complaint, 1592

Whose fire, - a love that next to heaven doth rest ;

Air,  - light of life that no distemper mars ;

Whose water grace, whose seas, whose springs, whose

showers,

Clothe Nature's earth with everlasting flowers!

Venus and Adonis, 749-50

Whereat the impartial gazer late did wonder,

Are on the sudden wasted, thaw'd and done,

As mountain-snow melts with the mid-day sun.

A Vale of Teares ... shrowds from the sun ...

Which tumbleth from the tops where
snow is  thow'd

Venus and Adonis, 779-784

For know, my heart stands armed in mine ear,

And will not let a false sound enter there; Lest the deceiving harmony should run

Into the quiet closure of my breast;

And then my little heart were quite undone,

In his bedchamber to be barr'd of rest.

Oxford, My mind to me a kingdom is (c.1575)

Content I live this is my stay

  I seek no more than may suffice,

I press to bear no haughty sway,

  for what I lack my mind supplies.

Lo thus I triumph like a king,

Content with that my mind doth bring.

...

I laugh not at another's loss,

  I grudge not at another's gain;

No worldly waves my mind can toss,

my state at one doth still remain.

Content and Rich

My conscience is my crown,

Contented thoughts my rest;

My heart is happy in itself,

My bliss is in my breast.

...

Whom favour doth advance ;

I take no pleasure in their pain,

That have less happy chance.

To rise by others' fall

I deem a losing gain.

Venus and Adonis, 1051-56

       threw unwilling light
Upon the wide wound that the boar had trench'd
In his soft flank, whose wonted lily white
With purple tears, that his wound wept, was drench'd.
No flow'r was nigh ...
But stole his blood, and seem'd with him to bleed.

The flight into Egypt, 7-14

Sunne being fled the starres do leese their light,
And shining beames, in bloody streames they drench ...
O blessed babes, first flowers of christian spring,
Who though untimely cropt, faire garlandes frame ...

Venus and Adonis, 1110

If he did see his face, why then I know

He thought to kiss him, and hath killed him so.

Loves Servile Lot

[ Love ] She offereth joy, affordeth grief,

A kiss, where she doth kill.

Lucrece, 158

Then where is truth, if there be no self-trust?

Saint Peters Complaint [SPC], 57

What trust to one, that truth it selfe defied?

Lucrece 211-215

What win I if I gain the thing I seek?

A dream, a breath, a froth of fleeting joy.

Who buys a minute's mirth to wail a week?

Or sells eternity to get a toy?

For one sweet grape who will the vine destroy?

Lucrece 867-868

The sweets we wish for turn to loathed sours

Even in the moment that we call them ours.

SPC, 85-88

Ah! life, sweet drop, drown'd in a sea of sours,

A flying good, posting to doubtful end ;

Still losing months and years to gain new hours,

Fain times to have and spare, yet forced to spend.

(95-96)

A flower, a play, a blast, a shade, a dream,
A living death, a never-turning stream.

Lucrece, 719

For now against himself he sounds this doom,

That through the length of times he stands disgrac'd;

Besides, his soul's fair temple is defac'd;

To whose weak ruins muster troops of cares,

To ask the spotted princess how she fares.

She says, her subjects with foul insurrection

Have batter'd down her consecrated wall,

And by their mortal fault brought in subjection

Her immortality, and made her thrall 725

To living death, and pain perpetual:

SPC, 371- 372

Much more my image in those eyes was graced,

in my self whom sin and shame defac'd.

SPC, 631-635

Christ, as my God, was templed in my thought,
As man. He lent mine eyes their dearest light;
But sin His temple hath to ruin brought,
And now he lighteneth terror from His sight.
Now of my late unconsecrate desires,
Profaned wretch! I taste the earned hires.

Lucrece, 764-69

O comfort-killing Night, image of   hell!
Dim register and notary   of shame!
Black stage for tragedies and murders fell,
Vast sin-concealing chaos! nurse of blame!
Blind muffled bawd! dark harbour for defame,
Grim cave of death!

Lucrece, 827-28

O unseen shame: invisible disgrace!

O unfelt sore! crest-wounding, private scar!

Lucrece, 860-61

Having no other pleasure of his gain

But torment that it cannot cure his pain.

SPC, 637-51

Ah   sin, the nothing that doth all things file:
Outcast from heaven, earthes curse, the cause

of   hell:
Parent of death ...

SPC, 647-649

Served with toil, yet paying nought but pain,

Man's deepest loss, though false-esteemed gain.

Shot, without noise: wound without present smart:

Lucrece, 836-40

My honey lost, and I, a drone-like bee,

Have no perfection of my summer left,

But robb'd and ransack'd by injurious theft:

In thy weak hive a wandering wasp hath crept,

And suck'd the honey which thy chaste bee kept.

SPC, 483-36
Shed on your hony drops you busy bees...

Hornets I hive, salt drops their labour plies,  

Suck' out of sin

Lucrece, 849

hate ful cuckoos hatch in sparrows' nests

SPC, 175

Fidelity was flown when feare was hatched, 

Incompatible brood in vertue's nest

Lucrece, 782

let thy misty vapours march so thick

Lucrece, 1040

To make more vent for passage of her breath

SPC, 13-14

Give vent unto the vapours of thy brest,

That thicken -

Lucrece, 1051-52

O! that is gone for which I sought to live,

And therefore now I need not fear to die.

SPC, 55-58

How can I live, that thus my life denied?

What can I hope, that lost my hope in fear?

What trust in one, that truth itself defied?

What good in him, that did his God forswear?

Lucrece, 1611-12

And now this pale swan in her watery nest

Begins the sad dirge of her certain ending.

SPC, 451-456

Like solest swan, that swims in silent deep,

And never sings but obsequies of death,

Sigh out thy plaints, and sole in secret weep,

In suing pardon spend thy perjured breath;

Attire thy soul in sorrow's mourning weed,

And at thine eyes let guilty conscience bleed.

William Shakespeare

Henry Constable (1590-91)

24

Mine eye hath played the painter and hath stelled

Thy beauty's form in table of my heart;

My body is the frame wherein 'tis held,

And perspective it is best Painter's art.

For through the Painter must you see his skill

To find where your true Image pictured lies,

Which in my bosom's shop is hanging still,

That hath his windows glazed with thine eyes:

Sonnetto nono

Thine eye the glass where I behold my heart,

Mine eye the window, through the which thine eye

May see my heart, and there thy self espy

In bloody colours how thou painted art.

31

Thy bosom is endeared with all hearts,

Which I by lacking have supposed dead ...

Their images I loved, I view in thee,

And thou (all they) hast all the all of me.

Todd's MS., To his Mistress

Grace full of grace! though in these verses here  
My love complains of others than of thee,  
Yet thee alone I lov'd and they by me
(Though yet unknown) only mistaken were  ...

The fire indeed from whence they caused be -

Which fire I now do know is you my dear,  
Thus diverse loves dispersed in my verse  
In thee alone for ever I unite -

46

Mine eye and heart are at a mortal war,

How to divide the conquest of thy sight,

Mine eye, my heart thy picture's sight would bar,

My heart, mine eye the freedom of that right,

My heart doth plead that thou in him dost lie,

(A closet never pierced with crystal eyes)

But the defendant doth that plea deny,

And says in him thy fair appearance lies.

To 'cide this title is impanelled

A quest of thoughts, all tenants to the heart,

And by their verdict is determined

The clear eye's moiety, and the dear heart's part.

As thus, mine eye's due is thy outward part,

And my heart's right, thy inward love of heart.

Sonnetto dodeci

My   Reason   (absent) did mine eyes require

To watch and ward, and such foes to descry

As they should near my heart approaching spy:

But traitor eies my heart's death did conspire,

(Corrupted with   Hope's   gifts) let in   Desire

To burn my heart: and sought no remedy,

Though store of water were in either eye

Which well employed, might well have quench'd the fire.

Reason   returnd,   Love   and   Fortune   made

Judges, to judge mine eyes to punishment:

Fortune,   sith they by sight my heart betrayed,

From wished sight adjudg'd them banishment:

Love,   sith by fire murdred my heart was found,

Adjudged them in tears for to be drown'd.

99

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 check for complexion dwells,

In my love's veins thou hast too grossly dyed."

The Lily I condemned for thy hand,

And buds of marjoram had stol'n thy hair,

The Rosesfearfully on thorns did stand,

One blushing shame, another white despair:

A third nor red, nor white, had stol'n of both,

And to his robbery had annexed thy breath,

But for his theft in pride of all his growth

A vengeful canker eat him up to death.

More flowers I noted, yet I none could see,

But sweet, or colour it had stol'n from thee.

Sonnetto decisette

My Lady's presence makes the Roses red,

Because to see her lips, they blush for shame:

The Lilly's leaves (for envie) pale became,

And her white hands in them this envie bred.

The Marigold the leaves abroad doth spread,

Because the suns: and her power is the same:

The Violet of purple colour came,

Dy'd in the blood, she made my heart to shed.

In brief, all flowers from her their vertue take;

From her sweet breath their sweet smells do proceed;

The living heat which her eye-beams doth make,

Warmeth the ground, and quickeneth the seed.

The rain wherewith she watereth the flowers,

Falls from mine eyes, which she dissolves in showers.

98

They were but sweet, but figures of delight:

Drawn after you, you pattern of all those

105

Let not my love be called Idolatry,

Nor my beloved as an Idol show -

106

When in the Chronicle of wasted time,

I see descriptions of the fairest wights,

And beauty making beautiful old rhyme,

In praise of Ladies dead, and lovely Knights,

Then in the blazon of sweet beauty's best,

Of hand, of foot, of lip, of eye, of brow,

I see their antique Pen would have expressed

Even such a beauty as you master now.

So all their praises are but prophecies

Of this our time, all you prefiguring ...

For we which now behold these present days,

Have eyes to wonder, but lack tongues to praise.

Todd's MS.,   III.4.

Miracle of the world! I never will deny,

That former poets praise the beauty of their days;

But all those beauties were but figures of thy praise,

And all those poets did of thee but prophesy ...

His [Petrarch's] songs were hymns of thee, which only now before

Thy image should be sung; for thou that goddess art

Which only we without idolatry adore.

145

Those lips that Love's own hand did make,

Breathed forth the sound that said I hat e,

To me that languished for her sake ...

I hate, from hate away she threw,

And saved my life saying not you.

23

O let my looks be then the eloquence,

And dumb presagers of my speaking breast,

Who plead for love, and look for recompense,

More than that tongue that more hath more expressed.

Marsh Ms.

My hope lay gasping on his dying bed,

Slain with a word, the dart of thy disdain:

Another word breathed life in it again,

And staunched the blood my wounded hope had shed.

Sweet tongue then sith thou canst revive the dead ...

One word gave life, one word can health restore;

If no? I live: but live as better no;

More thou speakest not, and if I call for more,

More is thy wrath, and thy wrath breeds my woe.

Sonett

Nachahmer

Werk

Jahr

Nr. / Zeile

1

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

S 45

2

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1592

III

2

Michael Drayton

The Shepheards Garland

1593

Ecl. 2

6

Richard Barnfield

Cynthia

1595

S 4

7

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

S 49

9

Christopher Marlowe

Hero and Leander

1593

I. 327-328

15

Richard Barnfield

The Affectionate Shepherd

1594

I. St. 46

18

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1592

XXXVI

19

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1592

XLVI

19

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

Dedic. North.

Eleg. 15

19

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1601

XXIII

20

Richard Barnfield

The Affectionate Shepherd

1594

I. St. 35

21

Richard Barnfield

The Affectionate Shepherd

Cynthia

1594

1595

II. St. 25

S 12

23

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1592

VIII

23

Edmund Spenser

Amoretti

1595

XLIII

24

Henry Constable

Diana

1590-91

ed. 1592

Sonn. nono

24

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1591

XIII

27

Bartholomew Griffin

Fidessa

1596

14

29

Anonymous

The Reign of King Edward III

1592-93

ed. 1596

V/1

31

Henry Constable

Diana

1590-91

Dedic. poem

38

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1594

Dedic. poem

38

Michael Drayton

Ideas Mirror

1594

VIII

44

Edmund Spenser

Amoretti

1595

LV

46

Henry Constable

Diana

1590-91

ed. 1592

Sonn. dodeci

46

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

S 20

46

Michael Drayton

Ideas Mirror

1594

XXXIII

53

Richard Barnfield

Cynthia

1595

S 17

55

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1592

XXXVII

56

Richard Barnfield

Greenes funerall

1594

S 4

63

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1592

XLVI

63

Michael Drayton

Ideas Mirror

1594

VIII

64

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1592

XXXVII

68

Richard Barnfield

Cynthia

1595

S 12

68

Bartholomew Griffin

Fidessa

1596

11

68

Michael Drayton

Ideas Mirror

1599

43

70

Christopher Marlowe

Hero and Leander

1593

I. 285-286

77

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

S 56

78

Richard Barnfield

Greenes funerall

1594

S 5

80

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

S 91

81

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1592

XXXIV

81

Michael Drayton

Ideas Mirror

1599

43

84

Gervase Markham

Devoreux, or Verities Tears

1597

Dedication

85

Richard Barnfield

Cynthia

1595

Cassandra

86

Richard Barnfield

Cynthia

1595

S 18

87

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1591

XXVII

87

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

S 15

94

Richard Barnfield

The Affectionate Shepherd

1594

II. St.39

94

Anonymous

The Reign of King Edward III

1592-93

ed. 1596

II/2

95

Richard Barnfield

Cynthia

1595

S 17

98

Henry Constable

Diana (Manuskript)

1590-91

Todd III.4

98

Richard Barnfie ld

The Affectionate Shepherd

1594

I. St. 3

99

Henry Constable

Diana

1590-91

ed. 1592

Sonn. decisette

102

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1592

XLVIII

105

Henry Constable

Diana (Manuskript)

1590-91

Todd III.4

106

Henry Constable

Diana (Manuskript)

1590-91

Todd III.4

106

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1592

XLVI

106

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

Canz. 1

106

Richard Barnfield

Cynthia

1595

S 12

117

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

S 11

119

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

S 49

125

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

S 4 / 15 / 81

129

E. C.

Emaricdulfe

1595

XXXVII

130

Richard Barnfield

Cynthia

1595

Cassandra

130

Bartholomew Griffin

Fidessa

1596

39

133

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

S 11 / 16

134

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

S 8 / 9 / 11

136

Christopher Marlowe

Hero and Leander

1593

I. 255-256

142

Samuel Daniel

Delia

1592.2

XXVII

142

Barnabe Barnes

Parthenophil and Parthenope

1593

S 20

142

Anonymous

The Reign of King Edward III

1592-93

ed. 1596

II/1

142

Samuel Daniel

The Complaint of Rosamond

1594

755-756

144

Richard Barnfield

The Affectionate Shepherd

1594

CC, St. 5

144

Michael Drayton

Ideas Mirror

1599

22

145

Henry Constable

Diana (Manuskript)

1590-91

Marsh Ms.

146

Bartholomew Griff in

Fidessa

1596

28

154

Giles Fletcher

Licia

1593

XXVII