English Wordplay ~ Listen and Enjoy

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Sonnet 72

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An anonymous writer on the internet claims that Shakespeare's sonnets were in fact written by Christopher Marlowe.  This same writer, drawing on Masonic insights, also claims that "the form of the Sonnets and the Great Seal of the United States have a common origin in Masonic symbolism."  He wonders whether the publication of the Sonnets was in any way connected with colonisation of Virginia: "It is noticeable that 'a Booke called Shakespeare's Sonnettes' was entered in the Stationers' Register on 20th May 1609, just three days before the Second Virginia Charter was granted (for the colonisation of America)."

O! lest the world should task you to recite
What merit lived in me, that you should love
After my death, - dear love, forget me quite,


    
The Great Seal of America

For you in me can nothing worthy prove;
Unless you would devise some virtuous lie,
To do more for me than mine own desert,
And hang more praise upon deceased I
Than niggard truth would willingly impart:
O! lest your true love may seem false in this
That you for love speak well of me untrue,
My name be buried where my body is,
And live no more to shame nor me nor you.
  For I am shamed by that which I bring forth,
  And so should you, to love things nothing worth.

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