Page:Shakespeare's Sonnets (1923) Yale.djvu/96

86 Come in the rearward of a conquer'd woe. Attack me after I have defeated one misfortune.

It is interesting to compare this sonnet on self-control with Hamlet's famous praise of the man who is not passion's slave (Hamlet III. ii. 59–79).

Wyndham paraphrases these lines: 'These self-contained persons may seem to lack generosity; but then, without making voluntary gifts, they give inevitably, even as the summer's flower is sweet to the summer, though it live and die only to itself. Yet let such one beware of corruption.'

This line occurs in the anonymous play of Edward III (published in 1596), II. i. 51. Though the opinion is not unanimous, many Shakespearean scholars believe the sonnet antedates the play, to which Shakespeare has sometimes been thought to have contributed certain scenes.

This couplet concludes sonnet 36 where, as many critics observe, it is more in keeping with the general idea of the poem.

buds of marjoram. The reference may be either to the color of the buds—reddish brown—or to their fragrance.

The first four lines of this sonnet may be paraphrased: Neither my own fears, nor the divining soul of the world dreaming of the future to which the present shall give way, can overpower the duration of my love, mistakenly supposed to be subject to the fate that limits all things.

mortal moon. Many scholars find in this sonnet definite allusions to contemporary events. Lee and others believe it celebrates the release of Southampton from prison, 1603. He was set free after the death of Elizabeth, whom contemporary poets celebrated as the moon goddess. ('The mortal moon hath her eclipse endured.') The motto of James I, who released Southampton, was 'Blessed are the