“Whanne that April with his shoures sote
“The droughte of March hath perced to the rote,
“And bathed every veine in swiche licour,
“Of whiche vertue engendred is the flour–.”
The Confessio Amantis of Gower, who died in 1402, begins thus: [ Berthelette's edit. 1532.]
“I maye not stretche uppe to the heven
“Myn honde, ne set al in even
“This worlde, whiche ever is in balaunce,
“It stant not in my suffisaunce–.”
Of Occleve’s translation of Egidius de Regimine principum, not having it before me, I cannot transcribe the first lines. But here are the first that Mr. Warton has quoted from that poet, and he probably did not choose the worst. I should add, that Occleve wrote in the reign of King Henry V., about the year 1420:
“Aristotle, most famous philosofre,
“His epistles to Alisaunder sent,
“Whos sentence is wel bet then golde in cofre,
“And more holsum, grounded in trewe entent–”
The following is the first stanza of the Letter of Cupide, written by the same authour, and printed in Thynne’s edition of Chaucer, 1561:
“Cupide, unto whose commaundement
“The gentill kinrede of goddes on hie
“And people infernall ben obedient,
“And al mortal folke serven busely,
“Of the goddesse sonne Cythera onely,
“To al tho that to our deite
“Ben subjectes, hertely greting sende we."
