“O Mistress mine, where are you roaming?O, stay and hear; your true love's coming,That can sing both high and low:Trip no further, pretty sweeting;Journeys end in lovers meeting,Every wise man's son doth know.What is love? 'Tis not hereafter;Present mirth hath present laughter;What's to come is still unsure:In delay there lies not plenty;Then, come kiss me, sweet and twenty,Youth's a stuff will not endure.”

“Journeys end in lovers meeting, Every wise man's son doth know.”

“honour pricks me on. Yea, but how if honour prick me off when I come on? How then? Can honour set a leg? No: or a arm? No: or take away the grief of a wound? No. Honour hath no skill in surgery then? No. What is honour? A word. What is that then? Air. A trim reckoning! - Who hath it? He that died o‘ Wednesday? Doth he feel it? No. Doth he hear it? No. ‘Tis insensible, then? Yea, to the dead. But will it not live with the living? No. Why? Detraction will not suffer it. Therefore I‘ll have none of it: honour is a mere scutcheon: - and so ends my catechism.”

“O Love, divine Love, why do You lay siege to me?In a frenzy of love for me, You find no rest.From five sides You move against me,Hearing, sight, taste, touch, and scent.To come out is to be caught; I cannot hide from You.If I come out through sight I see LovePainted in every form and color,Inviting me to come to You, to dwell in You.If I leave through the door of hearing,What I hear points only to You, Lord;I cannot escape Love through this gage.If I come out through taste, every flavor proclaims:"Love, divine Love, hungering Love!You have caught me on Your hook, for you want to reign in me."If I leave through the door of scentI sense You in all creation; You have caught meAnd wounded me through that fragrance.If I come out through the sense of touchI find Your lineaments in every creature;To try to flee from You is madness.Love, I flee from You, afraid to give You my heart:I see that You make me one with You,I cease to be me and can no longer find myself.If I see evil in a man or defect or temptation,You fuse me with him, and make me suffer;O Love without limits, who is it You love?It is You, O Crucified Christ,Who take possession of me,Drawing me out of the sea to the shore;There I suffer to see Your wounded heart.Why did You endure the pain?So that I might be healed.”

“Tho' you're tired and weary, still journey on, Till you come to your happy abode,Where all the love you've been dreaming of,Will be there at the end of the road.”

“And if, upon arrival, you find that your destination is not exactly as you had dreamed, do not be disappointed. Think of all you would have missed but for the journey there, and know that the true worth of your travels lies not in where you come to be at journey's end, but in who you come to be along the way.”