- ’Tis better to be vile than vile esteem’d,
- When not to be receives reproach of being;
- And the just pleasure lost, which is so deem’d
- Not by our feeling, but by others’ seeing:
- For why should others’ false adulterate eyes
- Give salutation to my sportive blood?
- Or on my frailties why are frailer spies,
- Which in their wills count bad what I think good?
- No, I am that I am, and they that level
- At my abuses reckon up their own:
- I may be straight though they themselves be bevel;
- By their rank thoughts, my deeds must not be shown;
- Unless this general evil they maintain,
- All men are bad and in their badness reign.