[25] 41 Nativity, once in the main of light: when a star has risen and entered on the full stream of light;—another of the astrological phrases no longer familiar.
Crooked eclipses: as coming athwart the Sun's apparent course.
Wordsworth, thinking probably of the 'Venus' and the 'Lucrece,' said finely of Shakespeare: 'Shakespeare could not have written an Epic; he would have died of plethora of thought.' This prodigality of nature is exemplified equally in his Sonnets. The copious selection here given (which from the wealth of the material, required greater consideration than any other portion of the Editor's task),—contains many that will not be fully felt and understood without some earnestness of thought on the reader's part. But he is not likely to regret the labour.
[26] 42 upon misprision growing: either, granted in error, or, on the growth of contempt.
— 43 With the tone of this Sonnet compare Hamlet's 'Give me that man That is not passion's slave' &c. Shakespeare's writings show the deepest sensitiveness to passion:—hence the attraction he felt in the contrasting effects of apathy.
[26] 44 grame: sorrow. Renaissance influences long impeded the return of English poets to the charming realism of this and a few other poems by Wyat.
[28] 45 Pandion in the ancient fable was father to Philomela.
[29] 47 In the old legend it is now Philomela, now Procne (the swallow) who suffers violence from Tereus. This song has a fascination in its calm intensity of passion; that 'sad earnestness and vivid exactness' which Cardinal Newman ascribes to the master-pieces of ancient poetry.
[31] 50 proved: approved.
— 51 censures: judges.