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Religious love put out religion's eye.
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Not to be tempted, would she be immured,
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And now to tempt all liberty procured.
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'"How mighty then you are, O hear me tell!
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The broken bosoms that to me belong
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Have emptied all their fountains in my well,
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And mine I pour your ocean all among.
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I strong o'er them, and you o'er me being strong,
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Must for your victory us all congest,
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As compound love to physic your cold breast.
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'"My parts had pow'r to charm a sacred nun,
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Who, disciplined, ay, dieted in grace,
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Believed her eyes when they t'assail begun,
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All vows and consecrations giving place,
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O most potential love, vow, bond, nor space,
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In thee hath neither sting, knot, nor confine,
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For thou art all, and all things else are thine.
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'"When thou impressest, what are precepts worth
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Of stale example? When thou wilt inflame,
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How coldly those impediments stand forth,
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Of wealth, of filial fear, law, kindred, fame!
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Love's arms are peace, 'gainst rule, 'gainst sense, 'gainst shame.
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And sweetens, in the suff'ring pangs it bears,
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The aloes of all forces, shocks and fears.
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'"Now all these hearts that do on mine depend,
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Feeling it break, with bleeding groans they pine,
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And supplicant their sighs to your extend,
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To leave the batt'ry that you make 'gainst mine,
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Lending soft audience to my sweet design,
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And credent soul to that strong-bonded oath,
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That shall prefer and undertake my troth."
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'This said, his wat'ry eyes he did dismount,
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Whose sights till then were levelled on my face;
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Each cheek a river running from a fount
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With brinish current downward flowed apace.
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O, how the channel to the stream gave grace!
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Who glazed with crystal gate the glowing roses
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That flame through water which their hue encloses.
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'O father, what a hell of witchcraft lies
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In the small orb of one particular tear!
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But with the inundation of the eyes
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What rocky heart to water will not wear?
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What breast so cold that is not warmed here?
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O cleft effect! cold modesty, hot wrath,
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Both fire from hence and chill extincture hath.
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'For lo, his passion, but an art of craft,
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Even there resolved my reason into tears;
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There my white stole of chastity I daffed,
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Shook off my sober guards and civil fears;
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Appear to him as he to me appears,
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All melting; though our drops this diff'rence bore:
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His poisoned me, and mine did him restore.
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'In him a plenitude of subtle matter,
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Applied to cautels, all strange forms receives,
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Of burning blushes or of weeping water,
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Or swooning paleness; and he takes and leaves,
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In either's aptness, as it best deceives,
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To blush at speeches rank, to weep at woes,
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Or to turn white and swoon at tragic shows;
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'That not a heart which in his level came
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Could scape the hail of his all-hurting aim,
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Showing fair nature is both kind and tame;
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And, veiled in them, did win whom he would maim.
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Against the thing he sought he would exclaim;
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When he most burned in heart-wished luxury,
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He preached pure maid and praised cold chastity.
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'Thus merely with the garment of a Grace
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The naked and concealed fiend he covered,
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That th' unexperient gave the tempter place,
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Which, like a cherubin, above them hovered.
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Who, young and simple, would not be so lovered?
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Ay me, I fell, and yet do question make
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What I should do again for such a sake.
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'O, that infected moisture of his eye,
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O, that false fire which in his cheek so glowed,
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O, that forced thunder from his heart did fly,
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O, that sad breath his spongy lungs bestowed,
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O, all that borrowed motion, seeming owed,
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Would yet again betray the fore-betrayed,
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And new pervert a reconciled maid.'
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THE END
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<<THIS ELECTRONIC VERSION OF THE COMPLETE WORKS OF WILLIAM
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SHAKESPEARE IS COPYRIGHT 1990-1993 BY WORLD LIBRARY, INC., AND IS
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PROVIDED BY PROJECT GUTENBERG ETEXT OF ILLINOIS BENEDICTINE COLLEGE
|
WITH PERMISSION. ELECTRONIC AND MACHINE READABLE COPIES MAY BE
|
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