Besechying God, for to geue me grace
Bokes to compyle, of moral vertue,

Of my maister Lidgate to folowe the trace,
His noble fame for to laude and renue,
Whiche in his lyfe the slouthe did eschue,
Makyng great bokes, to be in memory;
On whose soule, J pray God haue mercy.
FINIS."

Another edition of this poem, not mentioned in the former article, is "Historie of Graunde Amoure and La Bell Pucel," &c. printed by Jn. Waylande, 1554, 4to. black letter.*

P.B.

ART. VII. Rede me and be nott wrothe

For I saye no thinge bot trothe.

8vo. no date.

SUCH may be considered the title of this curious book; for what follows is "dialogue-wise" between the subject and the author of the satire, viz.

I will ascende makynge my state so hye,
That my pompous honoure shall never dye.

To this is the following response:

O catyfe when thou thynkest least of all,
With confusion thou shalt have a fall.

The boast and the prophesy are prevented from treading too closely upon each others heels, by the intervention of a coat of arms, allusive to the situation of the Cardinal before his elevation. This heraldic in

*See Bib. Harleian. Vol. III. No. 5935.

vention, of which an idea of the collected appearance may be formed from the subjects of which it is composed, is traced in black and crimson characters; and at the back of the same leaf is the following metrical

Descripcion of the armes."

Of the prowde Cardinall this is the shelde,
Borne up betwene two angels of Sathan ;
The sixe blouddy axes in a bare felde
Sheweth the crewelte of the red man.
Which hath devoured the beautifull swan;
Mortal enemy unto the Whyte Lion; *
Carter of Yorke the vyle butchers sonne.
The sixe bulles heddes in a felde blacke,
Betokeneth his stordy furiousness;

Wherefore the godly light to put abacke
He bringeth in his dyvlishe darkeness :
The Bandog in the middes doth expresse
The mastiff curre bred in Ypswitch towne,
Gnawinge with his teth a kynges crowne.

The clubbe signifieth playne his tiranny
Covered over with a Cardinals hatt,
Wherein shall be fulfilled the prophecy,
Aryse up Jacke and put on thy salatt ;
For the tyme is come of bagge and walatt,

The temporall chivalry throwen downe,

Wherfor prest take hede and beware thy croune.

* Titles adopted from the crests of Buckingham and Surry. We learn from the "prologue of the translatour" that the Knighte of the Swann, a French Romance, was translated at the request of the former. The printer (Copland) adds "this present history compyled, named Helyas, the Knight of the Swanne, of whom lineally is descended my said lord."

A correction at the end teaches us to read "whereby."
See Gifford's Massinger, Vol. I. p. 44.

From the conviction of the title page alone it will readily be conceived by those who remember the rancour with which Skelton was persecuted for his "Why come ye not to Court?" that Wolsey would not be backward to punish the author of the present more virulent attack. The writer, however, if he remained in England, successfully concealed himself, and procured the "litel boke" to be printed abroad by a friend, of no inferior zeal as it appears, who offered his assistance in future services of the like nature: "Yf any mo soche smale styckes," says he, "come unto youre hondes, which ye shall judge apte unto the augmentacion of this fyre, sende them unto me (yf in Englonde they may not be publisshed) and by Godde's grace with all my power and possibilitie I shall so endever myselfe to kyndle them that as many as are of the sede of Abraham shall se theyr light."

This light which was "to lighten the Gentiles," the Cardinal, however, spared neither pains nor expence to extinguish, that the influence of its beams might not be too extensive he endeavoured to get all the copies into his own possession: how well he succeeded in his purpose may be calculated from the rare occurrence of the tract even in the most curious collections. His authority was sufficient to suppress it during his life, but it was altered and reprinted at Wesell in 1546, in the preface to which we are informed that "this boke was prynted in the Cardinal hys tyme, whiche whon he harde that it was done, caused a certayne man, whome I coulde name if I lusted to bye them all uppe."

The intrinsic merit of the satire is sufficient to justify us in rejoicing that some few copies escaped the Cardinal's destructive inquisition.

A

The pasquinade is introduced by a dialogue between the author and "The treatous" wherein the latter urges the danger that awaits his venturing into the world from the displeasure of the Cardinal. Yf I presume to make relacion

Of secret matters that be uncertayne,
They will count it for diffamacion,
Or things contryved of a froward brayne.
To describe theyre faultes it is but vayne,
Excepte I were in some authoritie,

Wherefore my

deare author it cannot be.

The Author.

As touching that thou need not to be dejecte,
The truth shall be thy conservacion,

Whyles thou presume no faultes to detecte,
But wheare thou hast hadde certificacion
By theyre knowledge and informacion
Which have forsaken the whore of Rome :
Ut inveniatur iniquitas ejus ad odium.

The scruples of" the Treatous"are at length overcome, and the dialogue is succeeded by a lyrical lamentation, supposed to be "said or sung" by Wolsey, or some of his adherents, on account of the suppression of the mass, together with the loss of wealth, ease, and honours, of which the inhabitants "black, white, and grey," were deprived at the dissolution of the monastries. All the indignities which the Monks can 'be supposed to have suffered when "fallen from their high estate," the sensual gratifications in which they indulged, and the extravagant pomp which they assumed, are minutely detailed and lamented with mock solemnity, and each strophe, or antistrophe, is closed with a pathetic ejaculation.

Aproche proud patriark with your pope,
Bishops, Archbishops, and Cardinalls gaye,
With other prelats that had your hope
To be mayntayned by the masse allwaye;
Who shall find our belly and ryche araye,
Seyng that gone is the masse,

Now deceased, alas! alas!

Drawe nere ye priestes in your long gownes,
With all the fryers of the beggerly ordres,

Come byther Monkes with brode shaven crownes,
And all soche as are shorne above the ears:

Helpe me to lament with dolorous teares,
Seynge that gone is the masse,

Now deceased, alas! alas!

Two servants, Watkin and Jeffray, are now introduced debating the very natural question what course it would be prudent to take under the present adverse circumstances of their master: the dialogue commences with an explanation, on the part of the former, of the causes productive of the disgrace of the mass. Among many others more active in promoting the reformation in Germany, the author gives "a quip" to Erasmus on account of his pusillanimous and temporising policy during that period. The two "true and faithful servants" finding their master's degradation at hand at length resolve that

It is goode that they looke aboute,

Least they solfe a new lesson.

they then fall roundly to abusing and exposing the Cardinal.