The Sonnets

If my dear love were but the child of state,

It might for Fortuneʼs bastard be unfatherʼd,

As subject to Timeʼs love or to Timeʼs hate,

Weeds among weeds, or flowers with flowers gatherʼd.

No, it was builded far from accident;

It suffers not in smiling pomp, nor falls

Under the blow of thralled discontent,

Whereto thʼ inviting time our fashion calls:

It fears not policy, that heretic,

Which works on leases of short-numberʼd hours,

But all alone stands hugely politic,

That it nor grows with heat, nor drowns with showers.

To this I witness call the fools of time,

Which die for goodness, who have lived for crime.