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  • Title: Lucrece (Quarto, 1594)
  • Editor: Hardy M. Cook

    • ISBN: 978-1-55058-411-0

    Copyright Hardy M. Cook. This text may be freely used for educational, non-profit purposes; for all other uses contact the Editor.
    Author: William Shakespeare
    Editor: Hardy M. Cook
    Not Peer Reviewed

    Lucrece (Quarto, 1594)

    THE RAPE OF LVCRECE.

    Times glorie is to calme contending Kings,
    940To vnmaske falshood, and bring truth to light,
    To stampe the seale of time in aged things,
    To wake the morne, and Centinell the night,
    To wrong the wronger till he render right,
    To ruinate proud buildings with thy howres,
    945 And smeare with dust their glitring golden towrs.

    To fill with worme-holes stately monuments,
    To feede obliuion with decay of things,
    To blot old bookes, and alter their contents,
    To plucke the quils from auncient rauens wings,
    950To drie the old oakes sappe, and cherish springs:
    To spoile Antiquities of hammerd steele,
    And turne the giddy round of Fortunes wheele.

    To shew the beldame daughters of her daughter,
    To make the child a man, the man a childe,
    955To slay the tygre that doth liue by slaughter,
    To tame the Vnicorne, and Lion wild,
    To mocke the subtle in themselues beguild,
    To cheare the Plowman with increasefull crops,
    And wast huge stones with little water drops.
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