Yet him for this my love no whit disdaineth;
Suns of the world may stain, when heaven's sun staineth."
It is the loss of his friend he regrets, rather than the loss of his
mistress; she is not mentioned save by comparison with "basest clouds."
Yet even when read by Gradgrind and his compeers the thirteenth line of
this sonnet is utterly inconsistent with passion.
In the next sonnet the friend repents, and weeps the "strong offence,"
and Shakespeare accepts the sorrow as salve that "heals the wound"; his
friend's tears are pearls that "ransom all ill deeds." The next sonnet
begins with the line:
"No more be griev'd at that which thou hast done";
Shakespeare will be an "accessory" to his friend's "theft," though he
admits that the robbery is still sour. Then come four sonnets in which
he is content to forget all about the wrong he has suffered, and simply
exhausts himself in praise of his friend. Sonnet 40 begins:
"Take all my loves, my love, yea, take them all;
What hast thou then more than thou hadst before?
No love, my love, that thou may'st true love call; All mine was
thine, before thou hadst this more.
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