David Norbrook is Fellow and Tutor in English at Magdalen College, Oxford and Lecturer in English at the University of Oxford. He is the author of Poetry and Politics in the English Renaissance (Routledge, 1984).

H. R. Woudhuysen is a lecturer in the Department of English at University College London. He has edited Samuel Johnson on Shakespeare for the New Penguin Shakespeare Library.

Abbreviations Used in the Text
Preface
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Note on the Text and Annotation

I. The Public World
1. JOHN SKELTON: [from A Lawde and Prayse Made for Our Sovereigne Lord the Kyng]
2. SIR THOMAS MORE: De Principe Bono Et Malo
3. Quis Optimus Reipublicae Status
4. SIR DAVID LINDSAY: [from The Dreme] The Complaynt of the Comoun weill of Scotland
5. SIR THOMAS WYATT: [Who lyst his welth and eas Retayne]
6. In Spayn
7. [The piller pearisht is whearto I Lent]
8. HENRY HOWARD, EARLY OF SURREY: [Thassyryans king in peas with fowle desyre]
9. ANONYMOUS: John Arm-strongs last good night
10. ROBERT CROWLEY: Of unsaciable purchasers
11. JOHN HEYWOOD: [from A Ballad on the Marriage of Philip and Mary]
12. WILLIAM BIRCH: [from A songe betwene the Quenes majestie and Englande]
13. QUEEN ELIZABETH I: [The dowbt off future foes exiles my present joye]
14. SIR PHILIP SIDNEY: [from The Countesse of Pembrokes Arcadia]
15. ANONYMOUS: Of Sir Frauncis Walsingham Sir Phillipp Sydney, and Sir Christopher Hatton, Lord Chancelor
16. GEORGE PUTTENHAM: Her Majestie resembled to the crowned piller
17. ANNE DOWRICHE: [from The French Historie]
18. SIR WALTER RALEGH: [Praisd be Dianas faire and harmles light]
19. [from Fortune hath taken the away my love]
20. QUEEN ELIZABETH I: [Ah silly pugge wert thou so sore afraid]
21. SIR WALTER RALEGH: The 21th: and last booke of the Ocean to Scinthia
22. The Lie
23. ALEXANDER MONTGOMERIE: [Remembers thou in Aesope of a taill]
24. SIR JOHN HARINGTON: A Tragicall Epigram
25. Of Treason
26. FULKE GREVILLE, LORD BROOKE: [from Caelica] Sonnet 78
27. GEORGE PEELE: [from Anglorum Feriae]
28. JOHN DONNE: The Calme
29. [from Satire 4]
30. ROBERT DEVEREUX, EARL OF ESSEX: [Change thy minde since she doth change]
31. MARY SIDNEY, COUNTESS OF PEMBROKE: [To Queen Elizabeth]
32. EDMUND SPENSER: [from The Faerie Queene Book 5]
33. EOCHAIDH Ó HEÓGHUSA: [On Maguire's Winter Campaign]
34. BEN JONSON: On the Union
35. SIR ARTHUR GORGES: Written upon the death of the most Noble Prince Henrie
36. SIR HENRY WOTTON: Upon the sudden Restraint of the Earle of Somerset, then falling from favor
37. WILLIAM BROWNE: [from Brittania's Pastorals Book 2]
38. ANONYMOUS: Feltons Epitaph
39. ANONYMOUS: [Epitaph on the Duke of Buckingham]
40. SIR RICHARD FANSHAWE: [from An Ode Upon occasion of His Majesties Proclamation in the yeare 1630]
41. JOHN CLEVELAND: Epitaph on the Earl of Strafford
42. SIR JOHN DENHAM: Coopers Hill
43. MARTIN PARKER: Upon defacing of White-hall
44. ROBERT HERRICK: A King and no King
45. ANDREW MARVELL: An Horatian Ode upon Cromwel's Return from Ireland
46. SIR WILLIAM MURE: [from The Cry of Blood, and of a Broken Covenant]
47. KATHERINE PHILIPS: On the 3. of September, 1651
48. JOHN MILTON: To the Lord Generall Cromwell May 1652
49. To Sir Henry Vane the younger
50. ANDREW MARVELL: [from The First Anniversary of the Government under O.C.]
51. ALEXANDER BROME: On Sir G.B. his defeat

II. Images of Love
52. ANONYMOUS: [Westron wynde when wylle thow blow]
53. SIR THOMAS WYATT: [They fle from me that sometyme did me seke]
54. [Who so list to hount I knowe where is an hynde]
55. [It may be good like it who list]
56. [My lute awake perfourme the last]
57. HENRY HOWARD, EARL OF SURREY: [The soote season, that bud and blome furth bringes]
58. ALEXANDER SCOTT: [To luve unluvit it is ane pane]
59. GEORGE TURBERVILLE: To his Love that sent him a Ring wherein was gravde, Let Reason rule
60. ISABELLA WHITNEY: I.W. To her unconstant Lover
61. GEORGES GASCOIGNE: [A Sonet written in prayse of the brown beautie]
62. ANONYMOUS: A new Courtly Sonet, of the Lady Greensleeves
63. SIR PHILIP SIDNEY: [from Certain Sonnets: 4]
64. [from The Countesse of Pembrokes Arcadia]
65. [from Astrophil and Stella] 1
66. [from Astrophil and Stella] 2
67. [from Astrophil and Stella] 9
68. [from Astrophil and Stella] 72
69. [from Astrophil and Stella] 81
70. [from Astrophil and Stella] 83
71. [from Astrophil and Stella] Eight song
72. [from Astrophil and Stella] Eleventh song
73. FULKE GREVILLE, LORD BROOKE: [from Caelica] Sonnet 22
74. [from Caelica] Sonnet 27
75. [from Caelica] Sonnet 39
76. [from Caelica] Sonnet 44
77. [from Caelica] Sonnet 84
78. MARK ALEXANDER BOYD: Sonet
79. ROBERT GREENE: Dorons description of Samela
80. EDMUND SPENSER: [from The Faerie Queene Book 2]
81. [from The Faerie Queene Book 3]
82. [from The Faerie Queene Book 3]
83. [from Amoretti] Sonnet 23
84. [from Amoretti] Sonnet 64
85. [from Amoretti] Sonnet 67
86. [from Amoretti] Sonnet 70
87. [from Amoretti] Sonnet 71
88. Epithalamion
89. SIR WALTER RALEGH: [As you came from the holy land]
90. SAMUEL DANIEL: [from Delia] Sonnet 13
91. [from Delia] Sonnet 39
92. [from Delia] Sonnet 52
93. SIR JOHN DAVIES: [from Gullinge Sonnets]
94. [Faith (wench) I cannot court thy sprightly eyes]
95. THOMAS NASHE: The choise of valentines
96. JOHN DONNE: To his Mistress going to bed
97. BARNABE BARNES: [from Parthenophil and Parthenophe] Sonnet 27
99. CHRISTOPHER MARLOWE: The passionate Sheepheard to his love
99. Hero and Leander
100. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: [from Venus and Adonis]
101. [from Lucrece]
102. RICHARD BARNFIELD: [from Cynthia] Sonnet 8
103. [from Cynthia] Sonnet 11
104. WILLIAM SHAKESPEARE: [from Sonnets] 19
105. [from Sonnets] 20
106. [from Sonnets] 29
107. [from Sonnets] 35
108. [from Sonnets] 36
109. [from Sonnets] 55
110. [from Sonnets] 56
111. [from Sonnets] 66
112. [from Sonnets] 74
113. [from Sonnets] 94
114. [from Sonnets] 121
115. [from Sonnets] 124
116. [from Sonnets] 129
117. [from Sonnets] 135
118. [from Sonnets] 138
119. [from Sonnets] 144
120. ROBERT SIDNEY, EARL OF LEICESTER: Sonnet 21
121. Sonnet 25
122. Sonnet 31
123. Songe 17
124. GEORGE CHAPMAN: [from Hero and Leander Sestiad 3]
125. JOHN MARSTON: [from The Metamorphosis of Pigmalions Image]
126. THOMAS DELONEY: [Long have I lov'd this bonny Lasse]
127. ANONYMOUS: [from The wanton Wife of Bath]
128. [JOHN DOWLAND]: [Fine knacks for ladies, cheape choise brave and new]
129. THOMAS CAMPION: [Followe thy faire sunne unhappy shaddowe]
130. [Rose-cheekt Lawra come]
131. [There is a Garden in her face]
132. JOHN DONNE: His Picture
133. The Sunne Rising
134. The Canonization
135. Loves growth
136. A Valediction of weeping
137. A Valediction forbidding mourning
138. MICHAEL DRAYTON: [from Idea] 10
139. [from Idea] 61
140. To His Coy Love, A Canzonet
141. BEN JONSON: Why I Write Not of Love
142. My Picture left in Scotland
143. LADY MARY WROTH: [from Pamphilia to Amphilanthus] 23
144. [from Pamphilia to Amphilanthus] 34
145. [from Pamphilia to Amphilanthus] A crowne of Sonetts dedicated to Love
146. [from Pamphilia to Amphilanthus]
147. [from The Countesse of Mountgomeries Urania] 7
148. ROBERT HERRICK: Delight in Disorder
149. The Vision
150. The silken Snake
151. Her Bed
152. Upon Julia's haire fil'd with Dew
153. Upon Sibilla
154. THOMAS CAREW: The Spring
155. Ingratefull beauty threatned
156. [from A Rapture]
157. MARTIN PARKER: [from Cupid's Wrongs Vindicated]
158. [from Well met Neighbour]
159. EDMUND WALLER: The story of Phoebus and Daphne appli'd
160. Song
161. The Budd
162. SIR JOHN SUCKLING: [Out upon it, I have lov'd]
163. JOHN CLEVELAND: The Antiplatonick
164. RICHARD LOVELACE: Song. To Lucasta, Going to the Warres
165. Gratiana dauncing and singing
166. To Althea, From Prison
167. Her Muffe
168. [from On Sanazar's being honoured with six hundred Duckets by the Clarissimi of Venice, for composing an Elegiack Hexastick of the City. A Satyre]
169. ANDREW MARVELL: To his Coy Mistress
170. The Gallery
171. The Definition of Love
172. JAMES HARRINGTON: Inconstancy
173. KATHERINE PHILIPS: An Answer to another perswading a Lady to Marriage

III. Topographies
174. ALEXANDER BARCLAY: [from Certayne Egloges 5]
175. GEORGE BUCHANAN: Calendae Maiae
176. ANONYMOUS: [from Vox populi vox Dei]
177. ANONYMOUS: [from Jack of the North]
178. ANONYMOUS: The Jolly Pinder of Wakefield
179. BARNABE GOOGE: Goyng towardes Spayne
180. SIÔON PHYLIP: [from Yr Wylan]
181. SIR PHILIP SIDNEY: [from The Countesse of Pembrokes Arcadia]
182. EDMUND SPENSER: [from The Shepheardes Calender] Maye
183. ALEXANDER HUME: [from Of the day Estivall]
184. JOHN DAVIES: [from Epigrammes] In Cosmum 17
185. JOSEPH HALL: [from Virgidemiarum Book 5]
186. EVERARD GUILPIN: [from Skialetheia Satire 5]
187. ANONYMOUS: A Songe bewailinge the tyme of Christmas, So much decayed in Englande
188. JOHN DONNE: A nocturnall upon S. Lucies day, Being the shortest day
189. AEMILIA LANYER: The Description of Cooke-ham
190. BEN JONSON: To Penshurst
191. MICHAEL DRAYTON: [from Pastorals] The Ninth Eglogue
192. [from Poly-Olbion Song 6]
193. To the Virginian Voyage
194. SAMUEL DANIEL: [from Epistle. To Prince Henrie]
195. ANONYMOUS: On Francis Drake
196. W. TURNER: [from Turners dish of Lentten stuffe, or a Galymaufery]
197. JOHN TAYLOR: [from The Sculler] Epigram 22
198. WILLIAM BROWNE: [from Britannia's Pastorals Book 2]
199. EDWARD HERBERT, LORD HERBERT OF CHERBURY: Sonnet
200. RICHARD CORBETT: A Proper New Ballad Intituled the Faeryes Farewell: Or God-A-Mercy Will
201. SIR WILLIAM DAVENANT: The Countess of Anglesey lead Captive by the Rebels, at the Disforresting of Pewsam
202. GEORGE WITHER: [from Britain's...