| From fairest creatures we desire increase, | |
| That thereby beauty's rose might never die, | |
| But as the riper should by time decease, | |
| His tender heir might bear his memory: | |
| But thou contracted to thine own bright eyes, | |
| Feed'st thy light's flame with self-substantial fuel, | |
| Making a famine where abundance lies, | |
| Thy self thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel: | |
| Thou that art now the world's fresh ornament, | |
| And only herald to the gaudy spring, | |
| Within thine own bud buriest thy content, | |
| And tender churl mak'st waste in niggarding: | |
| Pity the world, or else this glutton be, | |
| To eat the world's due, by the grave and thee. |