How sweet and lovely dost thou make the shame
Which, like a canker in the fragrant rose,
Doth spot the beauty of thy budding name! (95.)
Shakespeare scorned to palter with the truth—"fair, kind and true" he had called his friend—but he saw his faults with the keen eye of love, that cannot bear an imperfection in the one who should be all-perfect.
Thou truly fair wert truly sympathized
In true plain words by thy true-telling friend; (82.)
and
I love thee in such sort,
As, thou being mine, mine is thy good report; (36.)
therefore in all love he warns him to take heed.