"Wel can the wise poet of Florence, That highté Dant, speken of this sentence: Lo, in such maner rime is Dante's tale. Ful selde upriseth by his branches smale Prowesse of man, for God of his goodnesse Will that we claime of him our gentillesse: For of our elders may we nothing claime But temporal thing, that man may hurt and maime. "Eke every wight wot this as wel as I, If gentillesse were planted naturelly Unto a certain linage down the line, Prive and apart, then wol they never fine To don of gentillesse the faire office, They mighten do no vilanie or vice. "Take fire and beare it into the derkest hous Betwixt this and the mount of Cau casus, And let men shut the dorés, and go thenne, Yet wol the fire as faire lie and brenne As twenty thousand men might it behold; His office naturel ay wol it hold, Is not annexed to possession, For God it wot, men may full often find A lordé's son do shame and vilanie. And he that wol have prize of his genterie, For he was boren of a gentil house, And had his elders noble and virtuous, And n'ill himselven do no gentil dedes, Ne folwe his gentil auncestrie, that dead is, Yet oft it falls that many a gentle mind Dwells in deformèd tabernacle drowned, Either by chance, against the course of kind, Or through unaptnesse in the substance found, Which it assumèd of some stubborne ground, That will not yield unto her form's direction, But is perform'd with some foul imperfection. WHEN I love, as some have told, ye Graces! make me fit Give me words wherewith to woo, You can make a Mercury. HERRICK. |