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man von Krystall gebildet hätte; sie zeigten nach ihrer Bestimmung den Lauf der Stunden an, und man kann zugleich das Räder- und Federwerk erkennen, das sie treibt."

Ausser seinen Dramen hat Shakspeare noch zwei epische Gedichte, The Rape of Lucretia und Venus and Adonis, so wie eine Reihe von Sonetten und Liedern hinterlassen. Die neueste, vollständigste und eleganteste Ausgabe seiner sämmtlichen Werke ist: The Pictorial Edition of the Works of Shakspere. Edited by Charles Knight. London (1839 fgde) 8 Bde in gr. 8.

When in disgrace with fortune and mens eyes,
I all alone beweepe my outcast state,

And trouble deafe heaven with my bootlesse cries,
And looke upon my selfe, and curse my fate,
Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,
Featured like him, like him with friends possest!
Desiring this man's art, and that man's scope,
With what I most injoy contented least:
Yet in these thoughts my selfe almost despising,
Haply I thinke on thee, and then my state,
(Like to the larke, at breake of day arising
From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven's gate;
For thy sweet love remembred, such welth
brings,

That then I scorne to change my state with kings.

Let me confesse that we two must be twaine,
Although our undevided loves are one:
So shall those blots that do with me remaine,
Without thy helpe, by me be borne alone,
In our two loves there is but one respect,
Though in our lives a seperable spight,
Which though it alter not love's sole effect,
Yet doth it steale sweet houres from love's delight.
I may not ever more acknowledge thee,
Least my bewailed guilt should doe thee shame;
Nor thou with publike kindnesse honour me,
Unlesse thou take that honour from thy name:
But do not so;. I love thee in such sort,
As thou being mine, mine is thy good report.

As a decrepit father takes delight

To see his active child doe deeds of youth
So I made lame by fortune's dearest spight,
Take all my comfort of thy worth and truth,
For whether beautie, birth, or wealth, or wit,
Or any of these all, or all, or more,
Intitled in their parts do crowned sit,
I make my love engrafted to this store:

So then I am not lame, poore, nor dispised,
Whilst that this shadow doth such substance give,
That I in thy aboundance am suffic'd,
And by a part of all thy glory live.

Looke what is best, that best I wish in thee;
This wish I have; then ten times happy me!

No longer mourne for me when I am dead,
Than you shall heare the surly sullen bell
Give warning to the world that I am fled
From this vile world, with vilest wormes to dwell:
Nay, if you read this line, remember not
The hand that writ it; for I love you so,
That I in your sweet thoughts would be forgot,
If thinking on me then should make you woe.
O if (I say) you looke upon this verse,
When I, perhaps, compounded am with clay,
Doe not so much as my poore name reherse;
But let your love even with my life decay:
Least the wise world should looke into your

mone

And mocke you with me after I am gone.

And I will comment upon that offence;
Say that thou didst forsake me for some fault,
Speak of my lamenesse, and I straight will hault;
Against thy reasons making no defence.
Thou canst not, love, disgrace me halfe so ill,
To set a forme upon desired change,
As Ile myself disgrace: knowing thy will,
I will acquaintance strangle, and looke strange;
Be absent from thy walkes; and on my tongue
Thy sweet beloved name no more shall dwell;
Lest I (too much profane) should do it wrong,
And haply of our old acquaintance tell.

For thee, against my selfe Ile vow debate,
For I must nere love him whom thou dost hate,

Alas, 'tis true, I have gone here and there, And made my selfe a motley to the view,

'Tis better to be vile, than vile esteem'd, When not to be, receives reproach of being,

Gor'd mine owne thoughts, sold cheape what is And the just pleasure lost, which is so deem'd,

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Then give me welcome, next my heaven the By their rancke thoughts my deeds must not be

best,

Even to thy pure and most most loving breast.

showne;

Unlesse this generall evill they maintaine,
All men are bad and in their badnesse raigne.

O for my sake doe you with fortune chide,
The guiltie goddess of my harmfull deeds,
That did not better for my life provide,
Than publick meanes, which publick manners
breeds.

Thence comes it that my name receives a brand,
And almost thence my nature is subbu'd
To what it workes in, like the dyer's hand.
Pitty me then, and wish I were reneu'd;
Whilst, like a willing patient, I will drinke
Potions of eysell, 'gainst my strong infection;
No bitternesse that I will bitter thinke,
Nor double pennance to correct correction.
Pitty me then, deare friend, and I assure ye,
Even that your pitty is enough to cure me.

Tyr'd with all these, for restfull death I cry;
As, to behold desart, a begger borne,
And needie nothing trim'd in jollitie,
And purest faith unhappily forsworne,
And gilded honour shamefully misplast,
And maiden vertue rudely strumpeted,
And right perfection wrongfully disgraced,
And strength by limping sway disabled,
And art made tongue-tied by authoritie,
And folly, (doctor like,) controuling skill,
And simple truth, mis- calde simplicitie,
And captive Good attending captaine Ill:
Tyr'd will all these, from these would I be
gone,
Save that, to dye, I leave my love alone.

Your love and pittie doth th' impression fill
Which vulgar scandall stampt upon my brow;
For what care I who calls me well or ill,
So you ore-green my bad, my good allow?
You are my All-the-world, and I must strive
To know my shames and prayses from your tongue;
None else to me, nor I to none alive.

That my steel'd sense or changes; right or wrong.
In so profound abisme I throw all care
Of others voyces, that my adder's sense
To critic and to flatterer stopped are.
Mark how with my neglect I doe dispense:

You are so strongly in my purpose bred,
That all the world besides me thinks y' are
dead.

Or shall I live your epitaph to make?
Or you survive when I in earth am rotten?
From hence your memory death cannot take
Although in me each part will be forgotten.
Your name from hence immortall life shall have,
Though I, (once gone,) to all the world must dye:
The earth can yeeld me but a common grave,
When you intombed in men's eyes shall lie:
Your monument shall be my gentle verse,
Which eyes not yet created shall ore-read;
And tongues to be, your being shall rehearse:
When all the breathers of this world are dead,
You still shall live (such vertue hath my pen,)
Where breath most breathes, even in the mouths
of men.

Two loves I have of comfort and despaire,
Which like two spirits doe suggest me still;
The better angel is a man right faire,
The worser spirit a woman, colour'd ill.
To winne me soone to hell, my female evill
Tempteth my better angell from my side,
And would corrupt my saint to be a devill,
Wooing his puritie with her fowle pride.
And whether that my angell be turn'd feend,
Suspect I may, yet not directly tell;
But being both from me, both to each friend,
I guesse one angeli in another's hell.

Yet this shall I ne'er know, but live in doubt,
Till my bad angel fire my good one out.

Those pretty wrongs that libertie commits,
When I am sometime absent from thy heart,
Thy beautie and thy yeares full well befits,
For still temptation followes where thou art.
Gentle thou art, and therefore to be wonne,
Beautious thou art, therefore to be assail'd;
And when a woman wooes, what woman's sonne
Will sourly leave her till she have prevailed.
Aye me! but yet thou might'st my seate forbeare
And chide thy beautie and thy staying youth,
Who lead thee in their ryot even there
Where thou art forct to break a two-fold truth;
Her's, by thy beautie tempting her to thee;
Thine, by thy beautie being false to me.

Never beleeve, though in my nature raign'd
All frailties that besiege all kinds of blood,
That it could so preposterously be stain'd,
To leave for nothing all thy summe of good;
For nothing this wide universe I call,
Save thou, my rose; in it thou art my all.

That thou art blam'd shall not be thy defect,
For slander's marke was ever yet the fair;
The ornament of beautie is suspect,
A crow that flies in heaven's sweetest ayre:
So thou be good, slander doth but approve
Thy worth the greater, being woo'd of time;
For canker vice the sweetest buds doth love,
And thou present'st a pure unstayned prime.
Thou hast pass'd by the ambush of young dayes,
Either not assail'd, or victor being charged;
Yet this thy praise cannot be so thy praise,
To tye up envy, evermore inlarged:

If some suspect of ill mask'd not thy show,
Then thou alone kingdomes of hearts shouldst

owe.

What potions have I drunke of Syren teares,
Distill'd from limbecks foule as hell within,
Applying feares to hopes, and hopes to feares,
Still loosing when I saw my selfe to win!
What wretched errors hath my heart committed,
Whilst it hath thought it selfe so blessed never!
How have mine eyes out of their spheares beene
fitted,
In the distraction of this madding fever!
O benefit of ill! now I finde true

That thou hast her, it is not all my griefe,
And yet it may be said I loved her dearly;
That she hath thee, is of my wayling cheef,
A losse in love that touches me more nearly.
Loving offenders, thus I will excuse yee:
Thou doest love her, because thou know'st I That better is by evill still made better;

love her;

And for my sake even so doth she abuse me,
Suffering my friend for my sake to approve her.
If I loose thee, my losse is my love's gaine,
And loosing her, my friend hath found that losse;
Both finde each other, and I loose both twaine,
And both for my sake lay on me this crosse:
But here's the joy; my friend and I are one;
Sweet flattery! then shee loves but me alone.

O never say that I was false of heart,
Though absence seem'd my flame to quallifie.
As easie might I from my selfe depart,
As from my soule which in thy breast doth lye:
That is my home of love: if I have ranged,
Like him that travails, I returne againe;
Just to the time, not with the time exchanged,
So that my selfe bring water for my staine.

And ruin'd love, when it is built anew,
Growes fairer than at first, more strong, far greater.
So I returne rebuked to my content,
And gaine by ills thrice more than I have spent.

That you were once unkind, befriends me now;
And for that sorrow, which I then did feele,
Needes must I under my transgressions bow,
Unless my nerves were brasse or hammer'd steele.
For if you were by my unkindnesse shaken,
As I by yours, y'have pass'd a hell of time;
And I, a tyrant, have no leasure taken
To waigh how once I suffer'd in your crime.
O that our night of woe might have remembred
My deepest sence, how hard true sorrow hits,
And soone to you, as you to me, then tendred
The humble salve which wounded bosomes fits!

But that your trespasse now becomes a fee; Mine ransoms your's, and your's must ran

some me.

Take all my loves, my love, yea, take them all;
What hast thou then more than thou hadst before?
No love, my love, that thou may'st true love call;
All mine was thine, before thou hadst this more.
Then if for my love thou my love receivest,
I cannot blame thee, for my love thou usest;
But yet be blamed, if thou thyselfe deceivest
By wilfull taste of what thy selfe refusest.
I dee forgive thy robb'ry, gentle theefe,
Although thou steale thee all my povertie;
And yet, love knowes, it is a greater griefe,
To beare love's wrong, than hate's knowne injury.
Lascivious grace, in whom all ill well showes,
Kill me with spight; yet we must not be foes.

How sweete and lovely dost thou make the shame
Which, like a canker in the fragrant rose,
Doth spot the beautie of thy budding name!
O, in what sweets doest thou thy sinnes inclose!
That tongue that tells the story of thy dayes,
(Making lascivious comments on thy sport,)
Cannot dispraise, but in a kind of praise:
Naming thy name, blesses an ill report.
O what a mansion have those vices got,
Which for their habitation choose out thee!
Where beautie's vaile doth cover every blot,
And all things turne to faire that eyes can see!
Take heede, deare heart, of this large priviledge;
The hardest knife ill-used doth loose its edge.

Thine eyes I love, and they, as pittying me,
Knowing thy heart, torment me with disdaine;
Have put on blacke, and loving mourners be,
Looking with pretty ruth upon my paine.
And truly not the morning sun of heaven
Better becomes the gray cheekes of the east,
Nor that full starre that ushers in the even,
Doth halfe that glory to the sober west,
As those two mourning eyes become thy face;
O let it then as well beseeme thy heart
To mourne for me, since mourning doth thee
grace,

And sure thy pitie like in every part.

Then will I sweare beauty herselfe is blacke, And all they foule that thy complection lacke

So now I have confest that he is thine,
And I myselfe am morgag'd to thy will;
Myselfe Ile forfeit, so that other mine
Thou wilt restore, to be my comfort still;
But thou wilt not, nor he will not be free,
For thou art covetous, and he is kinde;
He learned but, suretie-like, to write for me,
Under that bond that him as fast doth binde.
The statute of thy beauty thou wilt take,
Thou usurer that put'st forth all to use,
And sue a friend, came debtor for my sake;
So him I loose through my unkinde abuse.

Him have I lost; thou hast both him and me,
He paies the whole, and yet I am not free.

How oft, when thou, my musicke, musicke play'st,
Upon that blessed wood whose motion sounds
With thy sweet fingers, when thou gently sway'st
The wiry concord that mine eare confounds,
Doe I envie those jackes, that nimble leape
To kisse the tender inward of thy hand,
Whilst my poore lips, which should that harvest

reape

At the wood's bouldnesse by thee blushing stand!
To be so tickled, they would change their state
And situation with those dancing chips
O're whom thy fingers walke with gentle gate,
Making dead wood more bless'd than living lips
Since saucie jackes so happy are in this,
Give them thy fingers, me thy lips to kisse.

In loving thee thou know'st I am forsworne,
But thou art twice forsworne to me love swearing;
In act thy bed-vow broke, and new faith torne,
In vowing new hate after new love bearing.
But why of two oathes' breach doe I accuse thee
When I breake twenty? I am perjur'd most;
For all my vowes are oathes but to misuse thee,
And all my honest faith in thee is lost:
For I have sworne deepe oathes of thy deepe
kindenesse,

Oathes of thy love, thy truth, thy constancie;
And to enlighten thee, gave eyes to blindnesse,
Or made them sweare against the thing they see;

For I have sworne thee fair: more perjured I, To sweare, against the truth, so foule a lie!

Wotton.

Sir Henry Wotton aus altem edlem Geschlechte stammend, ward 1568 zu Bocton Hall in Kent geboren, machte seine Studien in Winchester und Oxford, ging dann auf Reisen, und trat bei seiner Rückkehr in die Dienste des Grafen von Essex. Als dieser mächtige Günstling gestürzt wurde, begab sich Wotton nach Florenz und verweilte hier bis zur Thronbesteigung Jakob's I., der ihn zum englischen Gesandten in Venedig ernannte. Nach seiner Zurückberufung wurde er Provost von Eton College wo er 1639 starb.

Henry Wotton ist nicht mit dem Kritiker William Wotton der mehr als ein Jahrhundert später lebte, zu verwechseln. Der Erstere hat im Ganzen nur wenige Gedichte hinterlassen, aber diese wenigen zeichnen sich durch Gedankenreichthum, Anmuth und Kraft so vortheilhaft aus, dass sie sich fortwährend im Andenken der Nation erhalten haben.

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