William Shakespeare

“ The Dedication.—The only begetter. Boswell remarks: "The begetter is merely the person who gets or procures a thing. So in Dekker's Satiromastix: 'I have some cousin-germans at court shall beget you the reversion of the master of the king's revels.' W. H. was probably one of the friends to whom Shakespeare's 'sugred sonnets,' as they are termed by Meres, had been communicated, and who furnished the printer with his copy." ”

“ Pity the world, etc. "Pity the world, or else be a glutton, devouring the world's due, by means of the grave (which will else swallow your beauty—cf. Sonn. 77. 6) and of yourself, who refuse to beget offspring" (Dowden) . Steevens conjectured "be thy grave and thee"="be at once thyself and thy grave."
II.—"In Sonn. 1 the Friend is 'contracted to his own bright eyes;' such a marriage is fruitless, and at forty the eyes will be 'deep-sunken.' The 'glutton' of 1 reappears here in the phrase 'all-eating shame;' the 'makest waste' of 1 reappears in the 'thriftless praise' of 2. ”

“ Sonnet I.—As Boswell and Boaden note, this and the following sonnets are only an expansion of V. and A. 169–174: "Upon the earth's increase why shouldst thou feed," etc.
"Herr Krauss (Shakespeare-Jahrbuch, 1881) cites, as a parallel to the arguments in favour of marriage in these sonnets, the versified dialogue between Geron and Histor at the close of Sidney's Arcadia, lib. iii." (Dowden) .
2. Rose. In the quarto the word is printed in italics and with a capital. See on 20. 8 below.
6. Self-substantial fuel. "Fuel of the substance of the flame itself" (Dowden) . ”