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I fear these stubborn lines lack power to move

Longaville
I fear these stubborn lines lack power to move.
(reads)
O sweet Maria, empress of my love—
These numbers will I tear and write in prose.
(tears the paper)
Berowne, (aside)
O, rhymes are guards on wanton Cupid's hose.
Disfigure not his shop!
Longaville, (taking another paper)
This same shall go.
(reads the sonnet)
Did not the heavenly rhetoric of thine eye,
‘Gainst whom the world cannot hold argument,
Persuade my heart to this false perjury?
Vows for thee broke deserve not punishment.
A woman I forswore, but I will prove,
Thou being a goddess, I forswore not thee.
My vow was earthly, thou a heavenly love.
Thy grace being gained cures all disgrace in me.
Vows are but breath, and breath a vapor is.
Then thou, fair sun, which on my Earth dost shine,
Exhal'st this vapor-vow; in thee it is.
If broken, then, it is no fault of mine.
If by me broke, what fool is not so wise
To lose an oath to win a paradise?
Berowne, aside
This is the liver vein, which makes flesh a deity,
A green goose a goddess. Pure, pure idolatry.
God amend us, God amend. We are much out o' th' way.

Source:
Act 4
Scene 3
Line 53

Source Type:

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