991Ah, wherefore with infection should he live,

992And with his presence grace impiety,

993That sin by him advantage should achieve,

994And lace itself with his society?

995Why should false painting imitate his cheek,

996And steal dead seeming of his living hue?

997Why should poor beauty indirectly seek

998Roses of shadow, since his rose is true?

999Why should he live, now nature bankrupt is,

1000Beggared of blood to blush through lively veins?

1001For she hath no exchequer now but his,

1002And proud of many, lives upon his gains.

1003 O, him she stores, to show what wealth she had

1004 In days long since, before these last so bad.

1006Thus is his cheek the map of days outworn,

1007When beauty lived and died as flowers do now,

1008Before these bastard signs of fair were born,

1009Or durst inhabit on a living brow;

1010Before the golden tresses of the dead,

1011The right of sepulchres, were shorn away,

1012To live a second life on second head;

1013Ere beauty's dead fleece made another gay.

1014In him those holy antique hours are seen,

1015Without all ornament, itself and true,

1016Making no summer of another's green,

1017Robbing no old to dress his beauty new;

1018 And him as for a map doth Nature store,

1019 To show false Art what beauty was of yore.

1021Those parts of thee that the world's eye doth view

1022Want nothing that the thought of hearts can mend;

1023All tongues, the voice of souls, give thee that due,

1024Utt'ring bare truth, even so as foes commend;

1025Thy outward thus with outward praise is crowned.

1026But those same tongues that give thee so thine own

1027In other accents do this praise confound,

1028By seeing farther than the eye hath shown;

1029They look into the beauty of thy mind,

1030And that in guess they measure by thy deeds;

1031Then, churls, their thoughts, although their eyes were kind,

1032To thy fair flower add the rank smell of weeds.

1033 But why thy odor matcheth not thy show,

1034 The soil is this, that thou dost common grow.