Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;

Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom:

If this be error, and upon me proved,

I never writ, nor no man ever loved.

WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE.

AT THE CHURCH GATE.

ALTHOUGH I enter not,

Yet round about the spot

Oft-times I hover:

And near the sacred gate,
With longing eyes I wait,
Expectant of her.

The Minster bell tolls out
Above the city's rout,

And noise and humming:
They've hushed the Minster bell;

The organ 'gins to swell:

She's coming, she's coming!

My lady comes at last,

Timid, and stepping fast,

And hastening hither,

With modest eyes downcast:

She comes she's here- she's past:
May heaven go with her!

Kneel undisturbed, fair saint!
Pour out your praise or plaint
Meekly and duly;

I will not enter there

To sully your pure prayer
With thoughts unruly.

But suffer me to pace
Round the forbidden place,
Lingering a minute

Like outcast spirits who wait
And see through heaven's gate
Angels within it.

WILLIAM MAKEPEACE THACKERAY.

BRITAIN'S IDA.

LOVE is life's end; an end but never ending;
All joys, all sweets, all happiness awarding;
Love is life's wealth (ne'er spent but ever spend-
ing),

Love's life's reward, rewarded in rewarding:

Then from thy wretched heart fond care remove. Ah! shouldst thou live but once love's sweets to

prove,

Thou wilt not love to live, unless thou live to love

EDMUND SPENSER.

ROMEO AND JULIET.

Rom. He jests at scars that never felt a wound.

JULIET appears above at a window.

But soft! What light through yonder window breaks!

It is the east, and Juliet is the sun!

Arise, fair sun, and kill the envious moon,

Who is already sick and pale with grief,

That thou, her maid, art far more fair than she.

Be not her maid, since she is envious;

Her vestal livery is but sick and green,

And none but fools do wear it; cast it off.

It is my lady; Oh! it is my love:

Oh, that she knew she were!

She speaks, yet she says nothing: what of that?
Her eye discourses: I will answer it.

I am too bold, 'tis not to me she speaks.
Two of the fairest stars in all the heaven,
Having some business, do entreat her eyes
To twinkle in their spheres till they return.
What if her eyes were there, they in her head?
The brightness of her cheek would shame those stars,
As daylight doth a lamp; her eyes in heaven
Would through the airy region stream so bright,
That birds would sing, and think it were not night.
See, how she leans her cheek upon her hand!
Oh, that I were a glove upon that hand,
That I might touch that cheek!

Ful. Ay, me!

Rom. She speaks!

Oh, speak again, bright angel! for thou art
As glorious to this night, being o'er my head,
As is a winged messenger of heaven
Unto the white-upturned wond'ring eyes
Of mortals that fall back to gaze on him,
When he bestrides the lazy-pacing clouds,
And sails upon the bosom of the air.

Jul. Oh, Romeo, Romeo! wherefore art thou
Romeo?

Deny thy father, and refuse thy name:
Or if thou wilt not, be but sworn my love,

And I'll no longer be a Capulet.

Rom. Shall I hear more, or shall I speak at this? Jul. 'Tis but thy name that is my enemy: Thou art thyself though, not a Montague. What's Montague? It is nor hand, nor foot, Nor arm, nor face nor any other part Belonging to a man. What's in a name?

Oh, be some other name!
That which we call a rose,
By any other name would smell as sweet.
So Romeo would, were he not Romeo called,
Retain that dear perfection which he owes,
Without that title. Romeo, doff thy name;
And for that name, which is no part of thee,
Take all myself!

Rom. I take thee at thy word:

Call me but love, and I'll be new baptized;
Henceforth I never will be Romeo.

Jul. What man art thou, that thus, bescreened

in night,

So stumblest on my counsel?

Rom. By a name

I know not how to tell thee who I am:
My name, dear saint, is hateful to myself,
Because it is an enemy to thee.

Had I it written, I would tear the word.

Jul. My ears have yet not drunk a hundred words

Of that tongue's utterance, yet I know the sound. Art thou not Romeo, and a Montague?

Rom. Neither, fair saint, if either thee dislike. Jul. How cam'st thou hither, tell me, and wherefore?

The orchard walls are high, and hard to climb;
And the place death, considering who thou art,
If any of my kinsmen find thee here.

Rom. With love's light wings did I o'er-perch these walls,

For stony limits cannot hold love out;

And what love can do, that dares love attempt:
Therefore thy kinsmen are no let to me.

Jul. If they do see thee, they will murder thee. Rom. Alack! there lies more peril in thine eye Than twenty of their swords; look thou but sweet, And I am proof against their enmity.

Jul. I would not for the world they saw thee here.

Rom. I have night's cloak to hide me from their sight;

And but thou love me, let them find me here;

My life were better ended by their hate,

Than death prorogued, wanting of thy love.