The Merchant's Tale
Folio 138v
2 of 30 folios
xxxx xxue / but as bryd / or as a beest
xx xxxertee / and vnder noon arest
xher as a wedded man / in his estat
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Lyueth a lyf / blisful and ordynat
Vnder this yok of mariage ybounde
Wel may his herte / in ioye and blisse habounde
For who kan be / so buxom as a wyf
Who is so trewe / and eek so ententyf
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To kepe hym syk and hool / as is his make
For wele or wo / she wol hym nat forsake
She nys nat wery / hym to loue / and serue
Thogh þt he ly bed rede / til he sterue
And yet som clerkes seyn / it is nat so
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Of whiche / he Theofraste / is oon of tho
What force / thogh Theofraste liste lye
¶ Ne tak no wyf quod he / for housbondrye
As for to spare / in houshold thy dispence
A trewe seruant dooth moore diligence
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Thy good to kepe / than thyn owene wyf
For she wol clayme / half part al hir lyf
And if thow be syk / so god me saue
Thy verray freendes / or a trewe knaue
Wol kepe thee bet than she / that wayteth ay
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After thy good / and hath do many a day
And if thow take a wyf / she wole destroye
Thy good substance / and thy body annoye
¶ This sentence / and an hundred thynges worse
Writeth this man / ther god his bones curse
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But tak no kepe / of al swich vanytee
Diffye Theofraste / and herke me
¶ A wyf is goddes yifte verraily
Alle othere manere yiftes hardily
As londes / rentes / pasture / or comune
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Or moebles / alle been yiftes of fortune
That passen / as a shadwe vp on the wal
But dreed nat if pleynly speke I shal
A wyf wol laste / and in thyn hous endure
Wel lenger than thee lyst perauenture
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¶ Mariage / is a ful greet sacrament
He / which þt hath no wyf I holde hym shent