Who Ever Loved, That Loved Not at First Sight?
From “Hero and Leander”
It lies not in our power to love or hate,
For will in us is over-ruled by fate.
When two are stript long e’er the course begin,
We wish that one should lose, the other win;
And one especially do we affect
Of two gold ingots, like in each respect:
The reason no man knows; let it suffice,
What we behold is censured by our eyes.
Where both deliberate, the love is slight:
Who ever loved, that loved not at first sight?
It lies not in our power to love or hate,
For will in us is over-ruled by fate.
When two are stript long e’er the course begin,
We wish that one should lose, the other win;
And one especially do we affect
Of two gold ingots, like in each respect:
The reason no man knows; let it suffice,
What we behold is censured by our eyes.
Where both deliberate, the love is slight:
Who ever loved, that loved not at first sight?
About this poem
These lines come from Christopher Marlowe’s narrative poem Hero and Leander, published in 1598 after his death.
The passage argues that love is not a matter of choice: “It lies not in our power to love or hate, / For will in us is over-ruled by fate.” Just as we favour one of two identical gold ingots for no reason, we fall in love with what our eyes see. The last line became famous at once — Shakespeare quotes it in As You Like It as a tribute to the “dead shepherd” Marlowe.