Sonnet 40
Take all my loves, my love, yea, take them all;
betrayal
jealousy
forgiveness
love
Take all my loves, my love, yea, take them all;
What hast thou then more than thou hadst before?
No love, my love, that thou mayst true love call;
All mine was thine before thou hadst this more.
Then if for my love thou my love receivest,
I cannot blame thee for my love thou usest;
But yet be blamed, if thou thyself deceivest
By wilful taste of what thyself refusest.
I do forgive thy robbery, gentle thief,
Although thou steal thee all my poverty;
And yet, love knows, it is a greater grief
To bear love's wrong than hate's known injury.
Lascivious grace, in whom all ill well shows,
Kill me with spites; yet we must not be foes.
What It Means
The young man has taken Shakespeare's mistress. Shakespeare's response is carefully controlled: fine, take her. You can't rob me of something I don't value for itself — she was only important because of you. But the real grievance is the deception. It wasn't the act, it was the betrayal of trust. The final couplet is the most pained statement yet: even if you hurt me, I can't hate you. My love for you is my weakness.
Context
Part of the Fair Youth sequence. Sonnets 40–42 form a group dealing with the young man having an affair with Shakespeare's mistress — a triangulation that appears later in the Dark Lady sequence too.
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