| Seccombe and Arber, comps. Elizabethan Sonnets. 1904. | | | | Amoretti and Epithalamion | | Sonnet XXV. How long shall this like dying life endure | | Edmund Spenser (1552?–1599) |
| | | HOW long shall this like dying life endure, | |
| And know no end of her own misery, | |
| But waste and wear away in terms unsure, | |
| ’Twixt fear and hope depending doubtfully? | |
| Yet better were at once to let me die, | 5 |
| And shew the last ensample of your pride; | |
| Than to torment me thus with cruelty, | |
| To prove your power, which I too well have tried. | |
| But yet if in your hardened breast ye hide | |
| A close intent at last to shew me grace; | 10 |
| Then all the woes and wrecks which I abide, | |
| As means of bliss I gladly will embrace; | |
| And wish that more and greater they might be, | |
| That greater meed at last may turn to me. | | | | |
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