Seccombe and Arber, comps. Elizabethan Sonnets. 1904.
Astrophel and StellaLXXXVI. Alas! whence came this change of looks? If I
Sir Philip Sidney (1554–1586)A
Have changed desert, let mine own conscience be
A still felt plague to self-condemning me!
Let woe gripe on my heart! shame load mine eye!
But if all faith, like spotless ermine, lie
Safe in my soul; which only doth to thee
(As his sole object of felicity)
With wings of love in air of wonder fly:
O ease your hand! treat not so hard your slave!
In justice, pains come not till faults do call:
Or if I needs, sweet Judge! must torments have;
Use something else to chasten me withal,
Than those blest eyes, where all my hopes do dwell.
No doom should make once heaven become his hell.