Have emptied all their fountains in my well,
And mine I pour your ocean all among:
I strong o'er them, and you o'er me being strong,
Must for your victory us all congest,
As compound love to physic your cold breast.
My parts had power to charm a sacred sun,
Who, disciplin'd, I dieted' in grace,
Believ'd her eyes, when they t' assail begun,
All vows and consecrations giving place.
O most potential love! vow, bond, nor space,
In thee hath neither sting, knot, nor confine,
For thou art all, and all things else are thine.
When thou impressest, what are precepts worth
Of stale example? When thou wilt inflame,
How coldly those impediments stand forth
Of wealth, of filial fear, law, kindred, fame?
Love's arms are peace, 'gainst rule, 'gainst sense, 'gainst
shame;
And sweetens, in the suffering pangs it bears,
The aloes of all forces, shocks, and fears.
Now, all these hearts that do on mine depend,
Feeling it break, with bleeding groans they pine;
And supplicant their sighs to you extend,
To leave the battery that you make 'gainst mine,
Lending soft audience to my sweet design,
And credent soul to that strong-bonded oath,
That shall prefer and undertake my troth."
This said, his watery eyes he did dismount,
Whose sights till then were level'd on my face;
Each cheek a river running from a fount
With brinish current downward flow'd apace.
O. how the channel to the stream gave grace!
Who, glaz'd with crystal, gate the glowing roses
That flame through water which their hue incloses.
O father! what a hell of witchcraft lies
In the small orb of one particular tear;
But with the inundation of the eyes'
What rocky heart to water will not wear?
1 From the quarto, 1609, the property of Lord F. Egerton. Malone's copy at Oxford has "I died" for "and dieted," which he substituted at the suggestion of a correspondent.
What breast so cold that is not warmed here?
O' cleft effect! cold modesty, hot wrath,
Both fire from hence and chill extincture hath!
For lo! his passion, but an art of craft,
Even there resolv'd my reason into tears;
There my white stole of chastity I daff'd ;
Shook off my sober guards, and civil fears:
Appear to him, as he to me appears,
All melting; though our drops this difference bore,
His poison'd me, and mine did him restore.
In him a plenitude of subtle matter,
Applied to cautels, all strange forms receives,
Of burning blushes, or of weeping water,
Or swooning paleness; and he takes and leaves,
In either's aptness, as it best deceives
To blush at speeches rank, to weep at woes,
Or to turn white, and swoon at tragic shows:
That not a heart which in his level came,
Could scape the hail of his all-hurting aim,
Showing fair nature is both kind and tame,
And veil'd in them, did win whom he would maim:
Against the thing he sought he would exclaim;
When he most burn'd in heart-wish'd luxury,
He preach'd pure maid, and prais'd cold chastity.
Thus, merely with the garment of a grace
The naked and concealed fiend he cover'd;
That th' unexperienc'd gave the tempter place,
Which, like a cherubin, above them hover'd.
Who, young and simple, would not be so lover'd?
Ah me! I fell; and yet do question make,
What I should do again for such a sake.
O, that infected moisture of his eye!
O, that false fire, which in his cheek so glowed!
O, that forc'd thunder from his heart did fly!
O, that sad breath his spungy lungs bestowed!
O, all that borrow'd motion, seeming owed,
Would yet again betray the fore-betray'd,
And new pervert a reconciled maid!
5 Or in old ed. Malone made the change.
The Passionate Pilgrime By W. Shakespeare. At London Printed for W. Iaggard, and are to be sold by W. Leake, at the Greyhound in Paules Churchyard. 1599." 16mo. 30 leaves.
The title-page first given to the edition of 1612 ran thus: "The Passionate Pilgrime. Or Certaine Amorous Sonnets, betweene Venus and Adonis, newly corrected and augmented. By W. Shakespere. The third Edition. Wherevnto is newly added two Loue-Epistles, the first from Paris to Hellen, and Hellen's answere backe againe to Paris. Printed by W. Iaggard. 1612." The title-page substituted for the above differs in no other respect but in the omission of " By W. Shakespere."
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