“Temps de doleur et de temptacion,
Aages de plour, d’envie et de tourment,
Temps de langour et de dampnacion,
Aages meneur près du definement,
Temps plains d’orreur qui tout fait faussement,
Aage menteur, plain d’orgueil et d’envie,
Temps sanz honeur et sanz vray jugement,
Aage en tristesse qui abrege la vie.”[1]
The ballads he has composed in this spirit may be counted by the dozen: monotonous and gloomy variations of the same dismal theme. There must have prevailed among the nobility a general disposition to melancholy; otherwise we could not account for the manifest popularity of these poems.
“Toute léesse deffaut,
Tous cueurs ont prins par assaut
Tristesse et merencolie.”[2]
Towards the end of the fifteenth century, the tone is still unchanged; Jean Meschinot sighs as did Deschamps.
“O miserable et très dolente vie!…
La guerre avons, mortalité, famine;
Le froid, le chaud, le jour, la nuit nous mine;
Puces, cirons et tant d’autre vermine
Nous guerroyent. Bref, miserere domine
Noz meschans corps, dont le vivre est très court.”[3]
He too is convinced that all goes wrong in the world; there is no justice any more; the great exploit the small, and the small exploit each other. He pretends to have been led by his hypochondria within an ace of suicide. He depicts himself in the following terms:
- ↑ Time of mourning and of temptation, Age of tears, of envy and of torment, Time of languor and of damnation, Age of decline nigh to the end, Time full of horror which does all things falsely, Lying age, full of pride and of envy, Time without honour and without true judgment, Age of sadness which shortens life.
- ↑ All mirth is lost, All hearts have been taken by storm By sadness and melancholy.
- ↑ O miserable and very sad life!… We suffer from warfare, death and famine; Cold and heat, day and night, sap our strength; Fleas, scab-mites and so much other vermin Make war upon us. In short, have mercy, Lord, upon our wicked persons, whose life is very short.
