Internet Shakespeare Editions

Author: William Shakespeare
Editor: Hardy M. Cook
Not Peer Reviewed

The Passionate Pilgrim (Octavo, 1599)


170BEauty is but a vaine and doubtfull good,
A shining glosse, that vadeth sodainly,
A flower that dies, when first it gins to bud,
A brittle glasse, that s broken presently.
A doubtfull good, a glosse, a glasse, a flower,
175 Lost, vaded, broken, dead within an houre.

And as goods lost, are seld or neuer found,
As vaded glosse no rubbing will refresh:
As flowers dead, lie withered on the ground,
As broken glasse no symant can redresse.
180 So beauty blemisht once, for euer lost,
In spite of phisicke, painting, paine and cost.