" But I that am not shaped for sportive tricks,

Nor made to court an amorous looking glasse,

I that am rudely stampt and want loves majesty,

To strut before a wanton ambling Nymph:

I that am curtaild of this faire proportion,

Cheated of feature by dissembling nature,

Deformd, unfinished, sent before my time

Into this breathing world scarce half made up,

And that so lamely and unfashionable,

That dogs bark at me as I halt by them:

Why I in this weak piping time of peace

Have no delight to pass away the time,

Unlesse to spy my shadow in the sun,

And descant on mine own deformity:

And therefore since I cannot prove a lover

To entertaine these faire well spoken days

I am determined to prove a villain,"

I'm not sure of how or why but something in this passage has felt familiar to me ever since I first read it many years ago although I have not, as Richard has, determined to prove a villain.

Is love a tender thing? it is too rough,
Too rude, too boisterous, and it pricks like thorn.

Pain pays the income of each precious thing.