Page:Romance of the Rose (Ellis), volume 1.pdf/221

With gentle tenderness who cast
Ye into bondage, hard and fast?
Terrors of rich men Nay! nay! The more of you they keep
Imprisoned, all the less sweet sleep
Enjoy they, terror and affright
Pursue them, and in wretched plight
Are they whose hearts are aye oppressed
With anxious care, unsoothed by rest.
Perchance a many may be stirred
To hastily condemn my word
Hereof, reciting how great kings
Have shown that riches are the springs5580
Of glory, when, as saith the crowd,
To strengthen and maintain their proud
And noble state they hire of men
Five hundred or five thousand: then
The commons cry: ‘Doth not then this
Show forth their glorious life, ywis?’
But God knows well that ’tis not so,
For all this valiance doth but show
They live their lives in mortal fear.
Far more of happiness doth cheer5590
The very beggar of the street.
Who feels no terror lest he meet
Thieves in his daily round; but kings,
In furred robes set with jewellings
And gold, atremble live, lest they
To wandering robbers fall a prey,
Who would no scruple feel to kill
Their king moreover, lest he spill
Their blood in vengeance of the crime;
For he alive, they know their time5600