8 What is the resolution of sonnet 116?

Finally, quatrain three nails home the theme, with love's undying essence prevailing against the "bending sickle" of Time. Time's "hours and weeks" are "brief" compared to love's longevity, and only some great and final destruction of apocalyptic proportions could spell its doom. Note here the reference back to the nautical imagery of quatrain two with the use of the word "compass" in line 10.

Sonnet 116 closes with a rather hefty wager against the validity of the poet's words: he writes that if what he claims above is proven untrue, then he "never writ, nor no man ever loved."