| THAT thou art blam’d shall not be thy defect | |
| For slander’s mark was ever yet the fair; | |
| The ornament of beauty is suspect, | |
| A crow that flies in heaven’s sweetest air. | |
| So thou be good, slander doth but approve | 5 |
| Thy worth the greater, being woo’d of time; | |
| For canker vice the sweetest buds doth love, | |
| And thou present’st a pure unstained prime. | |
| Thou hast pass’d by the ambush of young days, | |
| Either not assail’d, or victor being charg’d; | 10 |
| Yet this thy praise cannot be so thy praise, | |
| To tie up envy evermore enlarg’d: | |
| If some suspect of ill mask’d not thy show, | |
| Then thou alone kingdoms of hearts shouldst owe. |