A renouncing of Love

FAREWELL, Love, and all thy laws for ever;

Thy baited hooks shall tangle me no more:

Senec, and Plato, call me from thy lore,

To perfect wealth, my wit for to endeavour;

In blind error when I did persever,

Thy sharp repulse, that pricketh aye so sore,

Taught me in trifles that I set no store;

But scaped forth thence, since, liberty is lever:

Therefore, farewell, go trouble younger hearts,

And in me claim no more authority:

With idle youth go use thy property,

And thereon spend thy many brittle darts:

For, hitherto though I have lost my time,

Me list no longer rotten boughs to clime.