CXXI. 'Tis better to be vile than vile efteemed, Or on my frailties why are frailer spies, Which in their wills count bad what I think good? No, I am that I am, and they that level At my abuses reckon up their own: I may be straight, though they themselves be bevel; By their rank thoughts my deeds must not be shown; Unless this general evil they maintain, All men are bad and in their badness reign. CXXII. Thy gift, thy tables, are within my brain Or, at the least, so long as brain and heart Till each to razed oblivion yield his part CXXIII. No, Time, thou shalt not boast that I do change: Our dates are brief, and therefore we admire And rather make them born to our defire Than think that we before have heard them told. Thy registers and thee I both defy, Not wondering at the prefent nor the past, For thy records and what we see doth lie, Made more or lefs by thy continual haste. This I do vow, and this fhall ever be, I will be true, despite thy scythe and thee. CXXIV. If my dear love were but the child of state, It fuffers not in smiling pomp, nor falls Under the blow of thralled discontent, [gather'd. Whereto th' inviting time our fashion calls: It fears not policy, that heretic, Which works on leases of short number'd hours, But all alone stands hugely politic, [showers. That it nor grows with heat nor drowns with To this I witness call the fools of time, Which die for goodness, who have lived for crime. CXXV. Were 't aught to me I bore the canopy, Which prove more short than waste or ruining? No, let me be obfequious in thy heart, And take thou my oblation, poor but free, Which is not mix'd with seconds, knows no art Hence, thou fuborn'd informer! a true foul When most impeach'd stands leaft in thy control. |