In pretty wimpling play,
While streaming and gleaming
The river glides away.
XXIV.
Then Dread with Danger and Despair,
Forbade to mar my mind with care,
To rake above my reach.
What, tush, quoth Courage man go to,
No doughty deed he e’er can do.
That spares for every speech;
For I have oft heard Sages say,
And our experience tells,
That fortune helps the hardy ay.
And poltroons ay repels,
Then fear not, nor hear not.
Dread, Danger, or Despair,
The pain you complain
Of, is gone ere you get there.
XXV.
Yet Wisdom wishes thee to weigh
This figure in philosophy,
A lesson worth thine ear,
Which is in time to be a tent,
And not when time is past repent:
To buy Discretion dear.
Is there no honour after life,
That thou thyself must kill;
Wherefore has Atropos that knife?
I trow thou canst not tell;
Who but it wouldst cut it,
While Clotho scarce has spun,
Destroying thy joying
Before ’tis well begun.
XXVI.
What fool art thou to die for thrist,
And now may quench it if thou list,
So easily, but pain;
More honour is to vanquish ane.
Than fight with fifty and be tane,
