The Monk's Prologue
Folio 178r
3 of 4 folios
No poore Cloistrer / ne no nowys
But a gouernour / wyly and wys
And there wt al / of braunes & of bones
A wel faryng persone / for the nones
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I preye to god / ȝeue hī confusioū
That first the brougħt / vn to Religioū
Thow woldest han ben / a tredfoul a rigħt
Hadestow as gret a leue / as þu hast mygħt
To parfourme thy lust / in engendrure
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Thow haddest bygeten / ful many a creature
Allas / why werest þu / so wyde a cope
God ȝeue me sorwe / but and I were Pope
Nat oonly þu / but euery mygħty man
Thougħ he were shore ful heye / vp oon his pan
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Shulde haue a wyf / for al the world is lorñ
Religion hatħ take vp / al the corñ
Of tredynge / & we borel men ben shrympes
Of feble trees / there come wrecched ympes
This maketħ þt oure Eyres / ben so sklendre
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And fieble / þt they moun nat wel engendre
This maketħ þt oure wyues / woln assaie
Religious folk / for they moun bettre paie
Of venus paiementz / than moun we
God wot / no lussħburgħ / payen ȝe
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But be nat wrotħ my lord / thougħ þt I pleye
Ful ofte in game / a sootħ I haue herd seye
¶ This worthy Monke / toke al in pacience
And seide / I wol doon al my diligence
As fer as sovnetħ / in to honestee
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To telle ȝow a tale / or two or three
And if ȝow list / to herken hiderward
I wyl ȝow seyn / the lif of Seynt Edward
Or elles first / tagedies wol I telle
Of whicħ I haue an .C. / in my celle
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Tragedy is to seyn / a certeyn storie
As olde bookes maken / memorie
Of hī þt stood / in gret prosperitee
And is I fallen / out of heigħ degree
In to Miserie / and endetħ wrecchedly
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And they ben versified / comunly
Of sexe feet / whicħ men clepen exametron
In prose eke / ben endited many oon
And eke in metre / in many a sondry wyse
Loo this declaryng / ougħt I now suffise