- Those lines that I before have writ do lie,
- Even those that said I could not love you dearer:
- Yet then my judgement knew no reason why
- My most full flame should afterwards burn clearer.
- But reckoning Time, whose million’d accidents
- Creep in ’twixt vows, and change decrees of kings,
- Tan sacred beauty, blunt the sharp’st intents,
- Divert strong minds to the course of altering things;
- Alas! why fearing of Time’s tyranny,
- Might I not then say, ‘Now I love you best,’
- When I was certain o’er incertainty,
- Crowning the present, doubting of the rest?
- Love is a babe, then might I not say so,
- To give full growth to that which still doth grow?