SONNET XI.

TEARS, VOWS, and prayers, win the hardest heart:"
Tears, vows, and prayers, have I spent in vain!
Tears cannot soften flint, nor vows convert;
Prayers prevail not with a quaint disdain.
I lose my tears, where I have lost my love;
I vow my faith, where faith is not regarded; -
I pray in vain, a merciless to move:
So rare a faith ought better be rewarded. -
Yet though I cannot win her will with tears,
Though my soul's idol scorneth all my vows;
Though all my pray'rs be to so deaf ears, 15
No favour though the cruel fair allows;
Yet will I weep, vow, pray to cruel she:
Flint, frost, disdain, wears, melts, and yields we see.

SONNET XV.

2200

If that a loyal heart and faith unfeign'd,
If a sweet languish, with a chaste desire;
If hunger-starven thoughts, so long retain❜d,
Fed but with smoke, and cherish'd but with fire:
And if a brow with care's characters painted,
Bewrays my love with broken words half-spoken,
To her that sits in my thought's temple sainted,
And lays to view my vulture-gnawn heart open:
If I have done due homage to her eyes,
And had my sighs still tending on her name;
If on her love my life and honour lies,
And she (th' unkindest maid) still scorns the same:
Let this suffice, that all the world may see
The fault is her's, though mine the hurt must be.

·SONNET XII.

My spotless love hovers with purest wings
About the temple of the proudest frame;
Where blaze those lights fairest of earthly things,
Which clear our clouded world with brightest flame.
M' ambitious thoughts confined in her face,
Affect no honour, but what she can give:
My hopes do rest in limits of her grace, i
I weigh no comfort, unless she relieve.
For she that can my heart imparadise,
Holds in her fairest hand what dearest is; -
My fortune's wheels the circle of her eyes,
Whose rolling grace deign once a turn of bliss.
All my life's sweet consists in her alone;
So much I love the most unloving one.

SONNET XVI.

210

HAPPY in sleep, waking content to languish ;
Embracing clouds by night, in day-time mourn;
My joys but shadows, touch of truth my anguish!~
Griefs ever springing, comforts never born.
And still expecting when she will relent;
Grown hoarse with crying mercy, mercy give:
So many vows and prayers having spent,
That weary of my life, I loath to live.
And yet the hydra of my cares renews
Still new-born sorrows of her fresh disdain;
And still my hopes the summer-winds pursues, 22
Finding no end nor period of my pain.

This is my state my griefs do touch so nearly; →
And thus I live, because I love her dearly. →

SONNET XIII.

BEHOLD what hap Pigmalion had to frame,
And carve his proper grief upon a stone!
My heavy fortune is much like the same; 170
I work on flint, and that 's the cause I moan.
For hapless, lo! ev'n with mine own desires,
I figur'd on the table of mine heart,

The fairest form that all the world admires ;
And so did perish by my proper art.
And still I toil, to change the marble breast
Of her, whose sweetest grace I do adore;
Yet cannot find her breathe unto my rest:
Hard is her heart; and woe is me therefore!
But happy he, that joy'd his stone and art:
Unhappy I, to love a stony heart.

ช

SONNET XVII,

WHY should I sing in verse; why should I frame
These sad neglected notes for her dear sake?
Why should I offer up unto her name

The sweetest sacrifice my youth can make?
Why should I strive to make her live for ever,.
That never deigns to give me joy to live?
Why should m' afflicted Muse so much endeavour
Such honour unto cruelty to give?

If her defects have purchas'd her this fame,
What should her virtues do, her smiles, her love?
If this her worst, how should her best inflame?
What passions would her milder favours move?
Favours (I think) would sense quite overcome,
And that makes happy lovers ever dumb.

239

SONNET XIV.

THOSE Snary locks, are those same nets (my dear)
Wherewith my liberty thou did'st surprise;
Love was the flame that fired me so near, →
The dart transpiercing were those crystal eyes:
Strong is the net, and fervent is the flame; &
Deep is the wound, my sighs can well report: ▾
Yet do I love, adore, and praise the same,
That holds, that burns, that wounds me in this sort:
And list not seek to break, to quench, to heal
The bond, the flame, the wound that fest'reth so;
By knife, by liquor, or by salve to deal:
So much I please to perish in my woe.
Yet lest long travels be above my strength,
Good Delia lose, queuch, heal me now at length. →

SONNET XVIII.

241

SINCE the first look that led me to this errour, a
To this thought's maze, to my confusion tending;
Still have I liv'd in grief, in hope, in terrour,
The circle of my sorrows never ending,
Yet cannot leave her love that holds me hateful;
Her eyes exact it, though her heart disdains me :
See what reward he hath that serves th' ungrateful!
So true and loyal love no favour gains me. →
Still must I whet my young desires abated
Upon the flint of such a heart rebelling;
And all in vain, her pride is so innated,
She yields no place at all for pity'swelling.
Oft have I told her that my soul did love her,
(And that with tears) yet all this will not move her.

250

SONNET XIX.

RESTORE thy tresses to the golden oar;
Yield Citherea's son those arks of love:
Bequeath the Heav'ns the stars that I adore;
And to th' Orient do thy pearls remove.
Yield thy hands' pride unto the ivory white;
T" Arabian odours give thy breathing sweet:
'Restore thy blush unto Aurora bright;
To Thetis give the honour of thy feet.
Let Venus have thy graces, her resign'd;
And thy sweet voice give back unto the spheres ;
But yet restore thy fierce and cruel mind
To Hyrcan tigers, and to ruthless bears.
Yield to the marble thy hard heart again;
So shalt thou cease to plague, and I to pain.

SONNET XXIII

Time, cruel Time, come and subdue that brow,
Which conquers all but thee; and thee too stays,
As if she were exempt from scythe or bow,
From love or years unsubject to decays.
Or art thou grown in league with those fair eyes,
That they may help thee to consume our days?
Or dost thou spare her for her cruelties;
B'ing merciless, like thee, that no man weighs?
And yet thou see'st thy pow'r she disobeys;
Cares not for thee, but lets thee waste in vain;
And prodigal of hours and years, betrays
Beauty and youth t' opinion and disdain.
Yet spare her, Time; let her exempted be:
She may become more kind to thee, or me.

SONNET XX.

WHAT it is to breathe and live without life;
How to be pale with anguish, red with fear;
T have peace abroad, and nought within but strife;
Wish to be present, and yet shun t' appear:
How to be bold far off, and bashful near:
How to think much, and have no words to speak;
To crave redress, yet hold affliction dear:
To have affection strong, a body weak.
Never to find, and evermore to seek:
And seek that which I dare not hope to find.
T'affect this life, and yet this life disleek;
Grateful t' another, to myself unkind.
This cruel knowledge of these contraries,
Delia, my heart hath learn'd out of those eyes.

SONNET XXIV.

These sorrow'ng sighs, the smoke of mine annoy;
These tears which heat of sacred flame distils;
Are those due tributes, that my faith doth pay
Unto the tyrant, whose unkindness kills.
I sacrifice my youth and blooming years
At her proud feet, and she respects not it:
My flow'r untimely 's wither'd with my tears;
And winter woes, for spring of youth unfit.
She thinks a look may recompense my care,
And so with looks prolongs my long-look'd case:
As short that bliss, so is the comfort rare;
Yet must that bliss my hungry thoughts appease.
Thus she returns my hopes so fruitless ever;
Once let her love indeed, or else look never.

SONNET XXI.

Ir beauty thus be clouded with a frown,
That pity shines no comfort to my bliss,
And vapours of disdain so over-grown,
That my life's light wholly endarken'd is:
Why should I more molest the world with cries;
The air with sighs, the earth below with tears?
Sith I live hateful to those ruthless eyes,
Vexing with untun'd moan her dainty ears.
If I have lov'd her dearer than my breath,
My breath that calls the Heav'ns to witness it;
And still must hold her dear till after death;
And that all this moves not her thoughts a whit:
Yet sure she cannot but must think a-part,
She doth me wrong, to grieve so true a heart.

SONNET XXV.

FALSE hope prolongs my ever certain grief;
Traitor to me, and faithful to my love!
A thousand times it promis'd me relief,
Yet never any true effect I prove.
Oft when I find in her no truth at all,
I banish her, and blame her treachery;
Yet soon again I must her back recal,
As one that dies without her company.
Thus often as I chase my hope from me,
Straightway she hastes her unto Delia's eyes;
Fed with some pleasing look there shall she be,
And so sent back, and thus my fortune lies.
Looks feed my hope; hope fosters me in vain :
Hopes are unsure, when certain is my pain.

SONNET XXII.

COME, Time, the anchor-hold of my desire,
My last resort, whereto my hopes appeal;
Cause once the date of her disdain t' expire:
Make her the sentence of her wrath repeal.
Rob her fair brow; break in on beauty; steal
Pow'r from those eyes, which pity cannot spare:
Deal with those dainty cheeks, as she doth deal
With this poor heart consumed with despair.
This heart! made now the prospective of care,
By loving her, the cruell'st fair that lives:
The cruell'st fair, that sees I pine for her;
And never mercy to thy merit gives.
Let her not still triumph over the prize
Of mine affections, taken by her eyes.

SONNET XXVI.

Look in my griefs, and blame me not to moura,
From care to care that leads a life so bad;
Th' orphan of Fortune, born to be her scorn,
Whose clouded brow do make my days so sad.
Long are their nights, whose cares do never sleep;
Loathsome their days, whom no sun ever joy'd:
Th' impression of her eyes do pierce so deep,
That thus I live both day and night annoy'd.
But since the sweetest root yields fruit so sour,
Her praise from my complaint I may not part:
I love th' effect the cause b'ing of this pow'r;
I'll praise her face, and blame her flinty heart:
Whilst we both make the world admire at us;
Her for disdain, and me for loving thus.

SONNET XXVII.

REIGN in my thoughts, fair hand, sweet eye, rare
Possess me whole, my heart's triumvirate: [voice;
Yet heavy heart, to make so hard a choice,
Of such as spoil thy poor afflicted state.
For whilst they strive which shall be lord of all,
All my poor life by them is trodden down ;
They all erect their trophies on my fall,
And yield me nought that gives them their renown.
When back I look, I sigh my freedom past,
And wail the state wherein I present stand;
And see my fortune ever like to last,
Finding me rein'd with such a heavy hand.
What can I do but yield?-And yield 1 do,
And serve all three; and yet they spoil me too.

SONNET XXVIII.

ALLUDING TO the sparrow, pursued bY A HAWK, THAT
FLEW INTO THE BOSOM OF ZENOCRATES.

WHILST by thy eyes pursu'd, my poor heart flew
Into the sacred refuge of thy breast;
Thy rigour in that sanctuary slew
That, which thy succ'ring mercy should have bless'd.
No privilege of faith could it protect,
Faith b'ing with blood, and five years witness sign'd,
Wherein no show gave cause of least suspect;
For well thou saw'st my love, and how I pin'd.
Yet no mild comfort would thy brow reveal,
No lightning looks which falling hopes erect;
What boots to laws of succour to appeal?
Ladies and tyrants never laws respect.
Then there I die, from whence my life should come;
And by that hand whom such deeds ill become.

SONNET XXIX.

STILL in the trace of one perplexed thought,
My ceaseless cares continually run on;
Seeking in vain what I have ever sought,
One in my love, and her hard heart still one.
I who did never joy in other sun,

And have no stars but those that must fulfil
The work of rigour, fatally began
Upon this heart, whom cruelty will kill.
Injurious Delia, yet I love thee still;

And will whilst I shall draw this breath of mine:
I'll tell the world, that I deserv'd but ill,
And blame myself t' excuse that heart of thine.
See then who sins the greater of us twain;
I in my love, or thou in thy disdain.

SONNET XXX.

OFT do I marvel, whether Delia's eyes
Are eyes; or else two radiant stars that shine!
For how could Nature ever thus devise
Of earth (on Earth) a substance so divine?
Stars sure they are, whose motions rule desires;
And calm and tempest follow their aspects:
Their sweet appearing still such pow'r inspires,
That makes the world admire so strange effects:
Yet whether fix'd or wand'ring stars are they,
Whose influ'nce rule the orb of my poor heart?
Fix'd sure they are; but wandring make me stray
In endless errours, whence I cannot part.
Stars then, not eyes, move you with milder view,
Your sweet aspect on him that honours you.
VOL. III.

SONNET XXXI.

THE star of my mishap impos'd this pain,
To spend the April of iny years in grief;
Finding my fortune ever in the wain,
With still fresh cares, supply'd with no relief.
Yet thee I blame not, though for thee 't is done:
But these weak wings presuming to aspire,
Which now are melted by thine eyes' bright sun,
That makes me fall from off my high desire.
And in my fall I cry for help with speed,
No pitying eye looks back upon my fears:
No succour find I now, when I most need,
My heats must drown in th' ocean of my tears:
Which still must bear the title of my wrong,
Caus'd by those cruel beams that were so strong.

SONNET XXXII.

AND yet I cannot reprehend the flight,
Or blame th' attempt presuming so to soar;
The mounting venture for a high delight,
Did make the honour of the fall the more.
Danger hath honour; great designs their fame:
For who gets wealth, that puts not from the shore?
And though th' event oft answers not the same,
Glory doth follow; courage goes before.
Suffice that high attempts have never shame.
The mean observer, whom base safety keeps,
Lives without honour, dies without a name,
And in eternal darkness ever sleeps.
And therefore, Delia, 't is to me no blot,
To have attempted, though attain'd thee not.

SONNET XXXIII.

RAISING my hopes on hills of high desire,
Thinking to scale the Heaven of her heart,
My slender means presum'd too high a part;
Her thunder of disdain forc'd me t' retire,
And threw me down to pain in all this fire;
Where lo I languish in so heavy smart,
Because th' attempt was far above my art:
Her pride brook'd not poor souls should so aspire.
Yet I protest, my high-desiring will
Was not to dispossess her of her right;
Her sov'reignty should have remained still;
I only sought the bliss to have her sight.
Her sight contented thus to see me spill,
Fram'd my desires fit for her eyes to kill.

SONNET XXXIV.

WHY dost thou, Delia, credit so thy glass,
Gazing thy beauty deign'd thee by the skies:
And dost not rather look on him, (alas!) [eyes?
Whose state best shows the force of murd'ring
The broken tops of lofty trees declare
The fury of a mercy-wanting storm;
And of what force thy wounding graces are,
Upon myself thou best may'st find the form.
Then leave thy glass, and gaze thyself on me;
That mirrour shows what pow'r is in thy face:
To view your form too much, may danger be;
Narcissus chang'd t' a flower in such a case.
And you are chang'd, but not t'a hyacint:
I fear your eye hath turn'd your heart to flint.
No

SONNET XXXV,

I ONCE may see when years shall wreck my wrong,
When golden hairs shall change to silver wire;
And those bright rays that kindle all this fire,
Shall fail in force, their working not so strong;
Then Beauty, (now the burthen of my song)
Whose glorious blaze the world doth so admire,
Must yield up all to tyrant Time's desire;
Then fade those flow'rs that deck'd her pride so long.
When if she grieve to gaze her in her glass,
Which then presents her winter-wither'd hue;
Go you, my verse; go tell her what she was:
For what she was, she best shall find in you.
Your fi'ry heat lets not her glory pass,
But (phenix-like) shall make her live anew.

SONNET XXXVI.

Look, Delia, how w' esteem the half-blown rose,
The image of thy blush, and summer's honour!
Whilst yet her tender bud doth undisclose
That full of beauty, Time bestows upon her.
No sooner spreads her glory in the air,

But straight her wide-blown pomp comes to declines;
She then is scorn'd, that late adorn'd the fair:
So fade the roses of those cheeks of thine!
No April can revive thy wither'd flow'rs,
Whose springing grace adorns the glory now:
Swift speedy Time, feather'd with flying hours,
Dissolves the beauty of the fairest brow.
Then do not thou such treasure waste in vain;
But love now, whilst thou may'st be lov'd again.

SONNET XXXIX.

WHEN winter snows upon thy sable hairs,
And frost of age hath nipt thy beauties near;
When dark shall seem thy day that never clears,
And all lies wither'd that was held so dear:
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 suffer'd for thee.
This may remain thy lasting monument,
Which happily posterity may cherish;
These colours with thy fading are not spent:
These may remain, when thou and I shall perish.
If they remain, then thou shalt live thereby ;
They will remain, and so thou can'st not die.

SONNET XL.

THOU can'st not die, whilst any zeal abouud
In feeling hearts, that can conceive these lines;
Though thou a Laura, hast no Petrach found,
In base attire yet clearly beauty shines.
And I (though born within a colder clime)
Do feel mine inward heat as great, (I know it:)
He never had more faith, although more rhyme;.
I love as well, though he could better show it.
But I may add one feather to thy fame,
To help her flight throughout the fairest isle:
And if my pen could more enlarge thy name,
Then should'st thou live in an immortal style.
For though that Laura better limned be,
Suffice thou shalt be lov'd as well as she.

SONNET XXXVII.

SONNET XLI.

Bɛ not displeas'd, that these my papers should
Bewray unto the world how fair thou art;
Or that my wits have show'd the best they could,
(The chastest flame that ever warmed heart!)
Think not, sweet Delia, this shall be thy shame,
My Muse should sound thy praise with mournful
How many live, the glory of whose name [warble;
Shall rest in ice, when thine is grav'd in marble?
Thou may'st in after-ages live esteem'd,
Unbury'd in these lines, reserv'd in pureness;
These shall entomb those eyes, that have redeem'd
Me from the vulgar, thee from all obscureness.
Although my careful accents never mov'd thee,
Yet count it no disgrace that I have lov'd thee.

SONNET XXXVIII.

SONNET XLII.

DELLA, these eyes that so admire thine,
Have seen those walls which proud ambition rear'd
To check the world; how they entomb'd have li'n
Within themselves, and on them ploughs have car'd.
Yet never found that barb'rous hand attain'd
The spoil of fame deserv'd by virtuous men;
Whose glorious actions luckily had gain'd
Th' eternal annals of a happy pen.
And therefore grieve not if thy beauties die;
Though time do spoil thee of the fairest veil,
That ever yet cover'd mortality;

And must enstar the needle and the rail.
That grace which doth more than enwoman thee,
Lives in my lines, and must eternal be.

SONNET XLIII.

Most fair and lovely maid! look from the shore,
See thy Leander striving in these waves !
Poor soul! quite spent, whose force can do no more!
Now send forth hope; for now calm pity saves.
And waft him to thee with those lovely eyes,
A happy convoy to a holy land:

Now show thy pow'r, and where thy virtue lies;
To save thine own, stretch out the fairest hand.
Stretch out the fairest hand, a pledge of peace;
That hand that darts so right, and never misses.
I shall forget old wrongs; my griefs shall cease:
And that which gave my wounds, I'll give it kisses.
Once let the ocean of my cares find shore;
That thou be pleas'd, and I may sigh no more.

SONNET XLIV.

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 honour'd so.
Who whilst I burn, she sings at my soul's wrack,
Looking aloft from turret of her pride;
There my soul's tyrant joys her, in the sack
Of her own seat, whereof I made her guide.
There do these smokes that from affliction rise,
Serve as an incense to a cruel dame;
A sacrifice thrice-grateful to her eyes,
Because their power serves to exact the samé.
Thus ruins she (to satisfy her will)

The temple where her name was honour'd still.

SONNET XLV.

My Delia hath the waters of mine eyes,
The ready hand-maids on her grace t' attend;
That never fall to ebb, but ever dries;
For to their flow she never grants an end.
The ocean never did attend more duly
Upon his sov'reign's course, the night's pale queen,
Nor paid the impost of his waves more truly,
Than mine unto her cruelty hath been.
Yet nought the rock of that hard heart can move,
Where beat their tears with zeal, and fury drives;
And yet I rather languish for her love,
Than I would joy the fairest she that lives.
And if I find such pleasure to complain,
What should I do then, if I should obtain ?

SONNET XLVI.

How long shall I in mine affliction mourn ?
A burden to myself, distress'd in mind!
When shall my interdicted hopes return
From out despair, wherein they live confin'd?
When shall her troubled brow, charg'd with disdain,
Reveal the treasure which her smiles impart?
When shall my faith the happiness attain,
To break the ice that hath congeal'd her heart?
Unto herself, herself my love doth summon,
(If love in her hath any pow'r to move)
And let her tell me as she is a woman,
Whether my faith hath not deserv'd her love?
I know her heart cannot but judge with me,
Although her eyes my adversaries be.

SONNET XLVII.

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 't is gone, as it had never been.
Soon doth it fade that makes the fairest flourish;
Short is the glory of the blushing rose:
The hue which thou so carefully dost nourish,
Yet which at length thou must be forc'd to lose.
When thou, surcharg'd with burthen of thy years,
Shalt bend thy wrinkles homeward to the earth;
And that in beauty's lease expir'd, appears
The date of age, the ealends of our death.
But ah! no more; this must not be foretold:
For women grieve to think they must be old.

SONNET XLVIII.

I MUST not grieve my love, whose eyes would read
Lines of delight, whereon her youth might smile;
Flowers have time before they come to seed,
And she is young, and now must sport the while.
And sport, sweet maid, in season of these years,
And learn to gather flow'rs before they wither;
And where the sweetest blossoms first appears,
Let love and youth conduct thy pleasures thither.
Lighten forth smiles to clear the clouded air,
And calm the tempest which my sighs do raise :
Pity and smiles do best become the fair;
Pity and smiles must only yield thee praise.
Make me to say, when all my griefs are gone,
Happy the heart that sigh'd for such a one.

SONNET XLIX.

AND whither, poor forsaken, wilt thou go,
To go from sorrow, and thine own distress?
When ev'ry place presents like face of woe,
And no remove can make thy sorrows less?
Yet go, forsaken; leave these woods, these plains:
Leave her and all, and all for her, that leaves
Thee and thy love forlorn, and both disdains';
And of both wrongful deems, and ill conceives.
Seek out some place; and see if any place
Can give the least release unto thy grief:
Convey thee from the thought of thy disgrace;
Steal from thyself, and be thy cares' own thief.
But yet what comforts shall I hereby gain?
Bearing the wound, I needs must feel the pain.

SONNET L.

DRAWN with th' attractive virtue of her eyes,
My touch'd heart turns it to that happy coast ;
My joyful North, where all my fortune hes,
The level of my hopes desired most:
There were my Delia fairer than the Sun,
Deck'd with her youth whereon the world doth smile;
Joys in that honour which her eyes have won,
Th' eternal wonder of our happy isle!
Flourish, fair Albion, glory of the North;
Neptune's best darling, held between his arms:
Divided from the world, as better worth;
Kept for himself, defended from all harms.
Still let disarmed peace deck her and thee;
And Muse-foe Mars abroad far foster'd be.