What Pleasure have

Great Princes

What pleasure have great princes
More dainty to their choice
Than herdsmen wild, who careless,
In quiet life rejoice,

And fortune's fate not fearing

Sing sweet in summer morning?

Their dealings plain and rightful,
Are void of all deceit;

They never know how spiteful
It is to kneel and wait
On favourite presumptuous

Whose pride is vain and sumptuous.

All day their flocks each tendeth;
At night they take their rest;
More quiet than who sendeth
His ship into the East,

Where gold and pearl are plenty;
But getting, very dainty.

For lawyers and their pleading,
They 'steem it not a straw;
They think that honest meaning
Is of itself a law:

Whence conscience judgeth plainly,
They spend no money vainly.

O happy who thus liveth!
Not caring much for gold;
With clothing which sufficeth
To keep him from the cold.
Though poor and plain his diet,
Yet merry it is, and quiet.

Yet if His
Majesty our
Sovereign
Lord

Yet if his majesty our sovereign lord
Should of his own accord

Friendly himself invite,

And say "I'll be your guest to-morrow night",

How should we stir ourselves, call and command

All hands to work! "Let no man idle

stand.

Set me fine Spanish tables in the hall,
See they be fitted all;

Let there be room to eat,

And order taken that there want no meat. See every sconce and candlestick made bright,

That without tapers they may give a

light.

Look to the presence: are

spread,

The dais o'er the head,

the carpets

The cushions in the chairs,

And all the candles lighted on the stairs? Perfume the chambers, and in any case Let each man give attendance in his place."

Thus if the king were coming would we do,

And 't were good reason too;

For 'tis a duteous thing

To show all honour to an earthly king,
And after all our travail and our cost,
So he be pleased to think no labour lost.
But at the coming of the King of Heaven
All's set at six and seven:

We wallow in our sin,

Christ cannot find a chamber in the inn. We entertain him always like a stranger, And as at first still lodge him in the manger.

Let not

the Sluggish Sleep

Let not the sluggish sleep
Close up thy waking eye,
Until with judgment deep
Thy daily deeds thou try:
He that one sin in conscience keeps
When he to quiet goes,

More venturous is than he that sleeps
With twenty mortal foes.

(B 325)

65

F