“All flesh doth frailty breed!”

Such is the power of love in gentle mind, That it can alter all the course of kind.

From good to bad, and from bad to worse, From worse unto that is worst of all, And then return to his former fall.

Who will not mercy unto others show, How can he mercy ever hope to have?

Be bold, and everywhere be bold.

Unhappie Verse, the witnesse of my unhappie state, Make thy selfe fluttring wings of thy fast flying Thought.

I was promised on a time To have reason for my rhyme; From that time unto this season, I received nor rhyme nor reason.

All for love, and nothing for reward.

Fresh spring the herald of love’s mighty king.

Joy may you have and gentle hearts content Of your loves couplement: And let faire Venus, that is Queene of love, With her heart-quelling Sonne upon you smile

All that in this delightful garden grows should happy be and have immortal bliss.

So let us love, dear Love, like as we ought; Love is the lesson which the Lord us taught.

Beauty is not, as fond men misdeem, an outward show of things that only seem.

My Love is like to ice, and I to fire: How comes it then that this her cold so great Is not dissolved through my so hot desire, But harder grows the more I her entreat?

In vain he seeketh others to suppress, Who hath not learn’d himself first to subdue.

Ah! when will this long weary day have end, And lende me leave to come unto my love? – Epithalamion

The man whom nature’s self had made to mock herself, and truth to imitate.