Seccombe and Arber, comps. Elizabethan Sonnets. 1904. | | Fidessa | Sonnet LVIII. O Beauty! Siren! kept with Circes rod! | Bartholomew Griffin (d. 1602) |
| O BEAUTY! Siren! kept with CIRCEs rod! | |
The faintest good in seem, but foulest ill! | |
The sweetest plague ordained for man by GOD! | |
The pleasing subject of presumptuous will! | |
Thalluring object of unstayed eyes! | 5 |
Friended of all, but unto all a foe! | |
The dearest thing that any creature buys! | |
And vainest too (It serves but for a shoe)! | |
In seem, a heaven; and yet from bliss exiling! | |
Paying, for truest service, nought but pain! | 10 |
Young mens undoing! Young and old beguiling! | |
Mans greatest loss, though thought his greatest gain! | |
True, that all this, with pain enough I prove; | |
And yet most true, I will FIDESSA love! | | | |
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