"Had we but world enough, and time, this coyness, lady, were no crime"

A conditional vision of limitless space and duration frames a seduction that is as philosophical as it is erotic. By imagining a universe with “world enough” and endless “time,” the speaker proposes a realm where courtship could unfold at leisure and modest delay would be perfectly decorous. Coyness here names not mere shyness but the ritualized withholding expected of a gentlewoman in the 17th century, part virtue, part social performance. Calling it “no crime” under infinite conditions acknowledges the courtesy and ceremony he would gladly honor if eternity were available.

The subjunctive mood, “Had we but…”, is a strategic hinge. It establishes a hypothetical paradise only to make it unattainable. From that premise, the poem pivots to its carpe diem logic: because we do not, in fact, possess boundless time, protracted reserve becomes a kind of theft from life. The line therefore recasts desire as an ethical calculus of scarcity. When time is finite, postponement is not neutral; it incurs a cost, and what would be blameless in eternity becomes questionable in mortality.

The diction blends flattery and pressure. He signals deference, he would wait forever, yet uses that gallantry to tighten the clock. This balance typifies metaphysical wit: push the emotional stakes to a cosmic scale, then drive them back into the body with sharpened urgency. The argument is not an outright dismissal of virtue, but a reminder that virtue itself must be negotiated with time. In a world where lovers are subject to decay and loss, decorum untethered from reality risks turning love into a missed opportunity.

The phrase has outlived its context because it distills a perennial truth. Affection, patience, and ritual are beautiful when time is abundant; when it is not, the moral landscape shifts. What sounds like a compliment becomes an ultimatum: if eternity were ours, we could linger; since it is not, lingering begins to look like surrender to oblivion.