Page:Romance of the Rose (Ellis), volume 1.pdf/193

How thus her nobleness doth speak
All trumpet-tongued ’gainst those who seek
Nought fairer in her work to see
Than carnal love and lechery.
For wot you well what those folk, who
But joyance seek herein, may do?
They give themselves as bondsmen o’er
To Satan, lord high chancellor4710
Of all foul vices, seen that this
The very fount and wellspring is
Of man’s worst woes, as Tully says.
Who, in his book ‘Of old age,’ lays
It clearly down that age should more
Be valued and esteemed therefore
Than youth, for man and maid doth youth
To follies numberless, forsooth,
Push on, and ’tis no simple thing
Both mind and body safe to bring4720
Through youth, devoid of shame, and free
From ills that curse posterity.

Youth and Age In youth run lawless passions wild,
Till folly is on folly piled.
By loose companions led aside
Man changeth oft, and roaming wide,
Becomes at last, perchance, a monk;
Within some dreary convent shrunk,
He casts off Nature’s glorious gift
Of freedom, in the hope to lift4730
A fool to heaven when in the pew
Of vows he lives, like hawk in mew.
And then perchance he finds too great
The load, and out the convent gate