Please help...I have to write an essay on this sonnet and there are some words I don't understand. "...durefull Oake..."?! If any of you know this sonnet and can offer suggestions please do. Thank you muchly, Rebecca

This one, right?

VI

Be not dismayed that her unmoved mind
Doth still persist in her rebellious pride:
And love not like to lusts of baser kind,
The harder won, the firmer will abide.
The durefull Oak, whose sap is not yet dried,
Is long ere it conceive the kindling fire;
But when it once doth burn, it doth divide,
Great heat, and makes his flames to heaven aspire.
So hard it is to kindle new desire,
In gentle breast that shall endure for ever:
Deep is the wound, that dints the parts entire
With chaste affects, that naught but death can sever.
Then think not long in taking little pain,
To knit the knot, that ever shall remain.

My guess is that 'durefull Oake' modernizes to 'durable Oak' or a tough, alive oak tree, full of sap. He's saying that the woman may be resisting now, like the tree would resist burning, but, like the tree, will eventually fire up.

pam

[www.global-language.com] says it is 'lasting', with the above line used for the cite.