Subtle as sphinx, as sweet and musical,
As bright Apollo's lute, strung with his hair:
And, when love speaks, the voice of all the gods
Makes heaven drowsy with the harmony.
Never durst poet touch a pen to write,
Until his ink were temper'd with love's sighs;
O, then his lines would ravish savage ears,
And plant in tyrant's mild humility.

WOMEN'S EYES.

From women's eyes this doctrine I derive; They sparkle still the right Promethean fire; They are the books, the arts, the academies, That show, contain, and nourish all the world; Else, none at all in aught proves excellent.

ACT V.

JEST AND JESTER.

Your task shall be

With all the fierce* endeavour of your wit,
To enforce the pained impotent to smile.

Biron. To move wild laughter in the throat of death?

It cannot be; it is impossible:

Mirth cannot move a soul in agony.

Ros. Why, that's the way to choke a gibing spiri:
Whose influence is begot of that loose grace,
Which shallow laughing hearers give to fools:
A jest's prosperity lies in the ear

Of him that hears it, never in the tongue
Of him that makes it.

SONG.

Spring. When daisies pied, and violets bluc,
And lady-smocks all silver-white,
And cuckoo-buds of yellow hue,
Do paint the meadows with delight,
The cuckoo then, on every tree,
Mocks married men, for thus sings he,
Cuckoo;

* Vehement

Cuckoo, cuckoo,-O word of fear,
Unpleasing to a married ear!

When shepherds pipe on oaten straws,
And merry larks are ploughmen's clocks,
When turtles tread, and rooks, and daws,
And maidens bleach their summer smocks,
The cuckoo then, on every tree,
Mocks married men, for thus sings he,
Cuckoo;

Cuckoo, cuckoo,-O word of fear,
Unpleasing to a married ear!.

Winter. When icicles hang by the wall,

And Dick the shepherd blows his nail,
And Tom bears logs into the hall,

And milk comes frozen home in pail,
When blood is nipp'd, and ways be foul,
Then nightly sings the staring owl,
To-who;

Tu-whit, to-who, a merry note,
While greasy Joan doth keel* the pot

When all aloud the wind doth blow,
And coughing drowns the parson's saw
And birds sit brooding in the snow,

And Marian's nose looks red and raw,
When roasted crabs† hiss in the bowl,
Then nightly sings the staring owl,
To-who;

To-whit, to-who, a merry note,
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.

་་་་

MEASURE FOR MEASURE.

ACT I.

VIRTUE GIVEN TO BE EXERTED.

HEAVEN doth with us, as we with torches do; Not light them for themselves: for if our virtues + Wild apples.

* Cool.

Did not go forth of us, 'twere all alike

As if we had them not. Spirits are not finely touch'd
But to fine issues:* nor nature never lends
The smallest scruple of her excellence,
But, like a thrifty goddess, she determines
Herself the glory of a creditor,
Both thanks and use.†

THE CONSEQUENCE OF LIBERTY INDULGED.

As surfeit is the father of much fast,
So every scope by the immoderate use
Turns to restraint: Our natures do pursue,
(Like rats that ravint down their proper bane,)
À thirsty evil; and when we drink, we die.

ELOQUENCE AND BEAUTY.

In her youth

There is a prones and speechless dialect,

Such as moves men; beside, she hath prosperous art
When she will play with reason and discourse,
And well she can persuade.

PARDON THE SANCTION OF WICKEDNESS.

For we bid this be done,

When evil deeds have their permissive pass,
And not the punishment.

A SEVERE GOVERNOR.

Lord Angelo is precise;

Stands at a guard|| with envy; scarce confesses
That his blood flows, or that his appetite

Is more to bread than stone; Hence shall we see
If power change purpose, what our seemers be.

RESOLUTION.

Our doubts are traitors,

And make us lose the good we oft might win,

By fearing to attempt.

*For high purposes.

Voraciously devour
On his defence

+ Interest.

§ Prompt

THE PRAYERS OF MAIDENS EFFECTUAL.

Go to lord Angelo,

And let him learn to know, when maidens sue,
Men give like gods; but when they weep and kneel,
All their petitions are as freely theirs
As they themselves would owe* them

ACT II.

ALL MEN FRAIL.

Let but your honour know,†

(Whom I believe to be most strait in virtue,)
That, in the working of your own affections,
Had time coherdt with place, or place with wishing,
Or that the resolute acting of your blood

Could have attained the effect of your own purpose,
Whether you had not some time in your life
Err'd in this point which now you censure him,
And pull'd the law upon you.

THE FAULTS OF OTHERS NO JUSTIFICATION OF
OUR OWN.

'Tis one thing to be tempted, Escalus, Another thing to fall. I not deny,

The jury, passing on the prisoner's life,

May, in the sworn twelve, have a thief or two Guiltier than him they try: What's open made to justice,

That justice seizes. What know the laws,

That thieves do passŞ on thieves? Tis very preg. nant. ||

The jewel that we find, we stoop and take it,
Because we see it; but what we do not see,
We tread upon, and never think of it.

You may not so extenuate his offence,

ForT I have had such faults; but rather tell me,
When I, that censure** him, do so offend,

Let mine own judgment pattern out my death,
And nothing come in partial.

* Have.

+ Examine.

§ Pass judgment. || Plain.

** Sentence.

+ Suited.

T Because.

MERCY FREQUENTLY MISTAKEN.

Mercy is not itself, that oft looks so; l'ardon is still the nurse of second wo.

MERCY IN GOVERNORS COMMENDED.

No ceremony that to great ones 'longs,
Not the king's crown, nor the deputed sword,
The marshal's truncheon, nor the judge's robe,
Become them with one half so good a grace,
mercy does.

As

Alas

THE DUTY OF MUTUAL FORGIVENESS

Why, all
souls that were, were forfeit once;
And He that might the vantage best have took,
Found out the remedy: How would you be,
If he, which is the top of judgment, should
But judge you as you are? O, think on that;
And mercy then will breathe within your lips,
Like man new made.

Yet show some pity.

JUSTICE.

Ang. I show it most of all, when I show justice, For then I pity those I do not know,

Which a dismiss'd offence would after gall;

And do him right, that, answering one foul wrong, Lives not to act another.

THE ABUSE OF AUTHORITY.

O, it is excellent

To have a giant's strength; but it is tyrannous
To use it like a giant.

Could great men thunder,

As Jove himself does, Jove would ne'er be quiet, every pelting, petty officer,

For

*

Would use his heaven for thunder; nothing but thunder.

Merciful heaven!

Thou rather, with thy sharp and sulphurous bolt, Split'st the unwedgeable and gnarledt oak,

* Paltry.

† Knotted.