by William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616)
Like as, to make our appetite more keen
Language: English
Like as, to make our appetite more keen, With eager compounds we our palate urge; As, to prevent our maladies unseen, We sicken to shun sickness when we purge; Even so, being full of your ne'er-cloying sweetness, To bitter sauces did I frame my feeding; And, sick of welfare, found a kind of meetness To be diseas'd, ere that there was true needing. Thus policy in love, to anticipate The ills that were not, grew to faults assur'd, And brought to medicine a healthful state Which, rank of goodness, would by ill be cur'd; But thence I learn and find the lesson true, Drugs poison him that so fell sick of you.
About the headline (FAQ)
Authorship:
- by William Shakespeare (1564 - 1616), no title, appears in Sonnets, no. 118 [author's text checked 1 time against a primary source]
Musical settings (art songs, Lieder, mélodies, (etc.), choral pieces, and other vocal works set to this text), listed by composer (not necessarily exhaustive):
- by Richard Simpson (1820 - 1876), "Sonnet CXVIII", 1866. [high voice and piano] [text not verified]
- by Rudi Spring (b. 1962), "Sonnet CXVIII", op. 72 no. 3 (1999) [vocal quintet: five solo voices a cappella (s-mez-a-t-bar)], from Drei Shakespeare-Gesänge, no. 3. [text not verified]
Available translations, adaptations, and transliterations (if applicable):
- FRE French (Français) (François-Victor Hugo) , no title, from Sonnets de Shakespeare, no. 118, published 1857
Researcher for this text: Emily Ezust [Administrator]
This text was added to the website: 2010-08-12
Line count: 14
Word count: 112