From “Cymbeline,” Act IV. Sc. 2.
FEAR no more the heat o’ the sun,
Nor the furious winter’s rages;
Thou thy worldly task hast done,
Home art gone, and ta’en thy wages:
Golden lads and girls all must,
As chimney-sweepers, come to dust.
Fear no more the frown o’ the great,
Thou art past the tyrant’s stroke;
Care no...
From “Hamlet,” Act I. Sc. 2.
QUEEN.—Good Hamlet, cast thy nighted color off,
And let thine eye look like a friend on Denmark.
Do not, forever, with thy veilèd lids
Seek for thy noble father in the dust:
Thou know’st ’t is common,—all that live must die,
Passing through nature to eternity.
HAMLET.—Ay, madam, it is common.
QUEEN...
Sonnet Cxlvi.
poor soul, the centre of my sinful earth,
Fooled by those rebel powers that thee array,
Why dost thou pine within and suffer dearth,
Painting thy outward walls so costly gay?
Why so large cost, having so short a lease,
Dost thou upon thy fading mansion spend?
Shall worms, inheritors of this excess,
Eat up thy charge?...
From “An Hymne of Heavenly Love”
WITH all thy hart, with all thy soule and mind,
Thou must him love, and his beheasts embrace;
All other loves, with which the world doth blind
Weake fancies, and stirre up affections base,
Thou must renounce and utterly displace,
And give thy selfe unto him full and free,
That full and freely gave himselfe...
From the Spanish by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
LORD, what am I, that, with unceasing care,
Thou didst seek after me,—that Thou didst wait,
Wet with unhealthy dews, before my gate,
And pass the gloomy nights of winter there?
O, strange delusion, that I did not greet
Thy blest approach! and, O, to heaven how lost,
If my ingratitude’s...
From “Hamlet,” Act III. Sc. 3.
The King. O, my offence is rank, it smells to heaven;
It hath the primal eldest curse upon ’t,
A brother’s murder. Pray can I not,
Though inclination be as sharp as will:
My stronger guilt defeats my strong intent;
And, like a man to double business bound,
I stand in pause where I shall first begin,...
[The author of this poem, one of the victims of the persecuting Henry VIII., was burnt to death at Smithfield in 1546. It was made and sung by her while a prisoner in Newgate.]
LIKE as the armèd Knighte,
Appointed to the fielde,
With this world wil I fight,
And faith shal be my shilde.
Faith is that weapon stronge,
Which wil not faile at...
When words are weak and foes encountering strong,
Where mightier do assault than do defend,
The feebler part puts up enforced wrong,
And silent sees that speech could not amend.
Yet higher powers most think though they repine,—
When sun is set, the little stars will shine.
While pike doth range, the silly tench doth fly,
And crouch in...
I Would I were an excellent divine,
That had the Bible at my fingers’ ends;
That men might hear out of this mouth of mine
How God doth make his enemies his friends;
Rather than with a thundering and long prayer
Be led into presumption, or despair.
This would I be, and would none other be,
But a religious servant of my God;...
Give me my scallop-shell of quiet,
My staff of faith to walk upon,
My scrip of joy, immortal diet,
My bottle of salvation,
My gown of glory, hope’s true gauge;
And thus I ’ll take my pilgrimage!
Blood must be my body’s balmer,
No other balm will there be given;
Whilst my soul, like quiet palmer,
Travelleth towards...
