The Summoner's Tale
Folio 83r
8 of 15 folios
And ther fore Thomas / trowe me if thee leste
Ne stryue nat with thy wyf as for thy beste
And bere this word awey / now by thy feith
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Touchynge swich thyng lo what the wise man seith
¶ With Inne thyn hous / ne be thow no leoū
To thy subgitz / do noon opperssioū
Ne make thyne aqueyntances / nat for to flee
And Thomas / yet eft soones I charge thee
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Be war from hire / that in thy bosom slepeth
War fro the serpent that so sleighly crepeth
Vnder the gras / and styngeth subtilly
Be war my sone / and herkne paciently
That twenty thousand men / han lost hir lyues
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For stryuyng with hir lemmans and hir wyues
Now sith ye han / so holy meke a wyf
What nedeth yow Thomas / to maken stryf
Ther nys ywis / no serpent so cruel
Whan man tret on his tayl / ne half so fel
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As womman is / whan she hath caught an Ire
Vengeance is thanne / al that they desire
Ire is a synne / oon of the grete of seuene
Abhomynable / vn to the god of heuene
And to hym self / it is destruccioū
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This euery lewed viker / or persoū
Kan seye / how Ire engendreth homicide
Ire is in sooth / executour of pryde
I koude of Ire / seye so muche sorwe
My tale / sholde laste til to morwe
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And ther fore praye I god / bothe day and nyght
An Irous man / god sende hym litel myght
It is greet harm / and certes greet pitee
To sette an Irous man in heigh degree
Whilom / ther was an Irous potestat
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As seith Senek that durynge his estat
Vp on a day / out ryden knyghtes two
And as Fortune wolde / that it were so
That oon of hem cam hom / that oother noght
Anon the knyght bifore the Iuge is broght
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That seyde thus / thow hast thy felawe slayn
For which / I deme thee to the deeth certayn