Page:Shakespeare's Sonnets (1923) Yale.djvu/28

18 

No more be griev'd at that which thou hast done:

Roses have thorns, and silver fountains mud;

Clouds and eclipses stain both moon and sun,

And loathsome canker lives in sweetest bud.

All men make faults, and even I in this,

Authorising thy trespass with compare,

Myself corrupting, salving thy amiss,

Excusing thy sins more than thy sins are;

For to thy sensual fault I bring in sense,—

Thy adverse party is thy advocate,—

And 'gainst myself a lawful plea commence:

Such civil war is in my love and hate,

That I an accessary needs must be

To that sweet thief which sourly robs from me.

 

Let me confess that we two must be twain,

Although our undivided loves are one:

So shall those blots that do with me remain,

Without thy help, by me be borne alone.

In our two loves there is but one respect,

Though in our lives a separable spite,

Which, though it alter not love's sole effect,

Yet doth it steal sweet hours from love's delight.

I may not evermore acknowledge thee,

Lest my bewailed guilt should do thee shame,

Nor thou with public kindness honour me,

Unless thou take that honour from thy name:

But do not so; I love thee in such sort

As thou being mine, mine is thy good report.

 2 fountains: springs

3 stain: dim

6 Authorising: sanctioning

with compare: by these comparisons

7 amiss: fault

8 Excusing thy sins; cf. n.

9 sense; cf. n.

13 accessary: accessory, helper

14 sourly: cruelly  5 respect: consideration, regard

6 separable: dividing, separating

13,14 But do not so good report; cf. n. 