The Tale

knew your wickedness; And Jesus, Filius Sirach, as I guess, He spake of you but seldom reverénce. A wildë fire and córrupt pestilence So fall upon your bodies yet tonight! Ne see ye not this honourable knight? Because, alas! that he is blind and old, His owen man shall makë him cuckóld. Lo, where he sits, the lechour, in the tree. Now will I granten, of my majesty, Unto this oldë blindë worthy knight, That he shall have again his eyen sight, When that his wife will do him villainy; Then shall be knowen all her harlotry, Both in reproof of her and other mo’.” “Yea, Sir,” quoth Proserpine, “and will ye so? Now by my mother Ceres’ soul I swear That I shall give her suffisant answér, And allë women after, for her sake; That though they be in any guilt y-take, With facë bold they shall themselves excuse, And bear them down that wouldë them accuse. For lack of answer, none of them shall dien. All had ye seen a thing with both your eyen, Yet shall we visage it so hardily, And weep, and swear, and chidë subtilly, That ye shall be as lewëd as be geese. What recketh me of your authorities? I wot well that this Jew, this Solomon, Found of us women foolës many one: But though that he foundë no good womán, Yet there hath found many another man Women full good, and true, and virtuoús; Witness on them that dwelt in Christë’s house; With martyrdom they proved their constánce. The Roman gestës makë remembránce Of many a very truë wife also. But, Sirë, be not wroth, albeit so, Though that he said he found no good womán, I pray you take the sentence of the man: He meant thus, that in sovereign bounté Is none but God, no, neither he nor she. Hey, for the very God that is but one, Why makë ye so much of Solomon? What though he made a temple, Goddë’s house? What though he werë rich and glorioús? So made he eke a temple of false goddës; How might he do a thing that more forbode is? Pardie, as fair as ye his name emplaster, He was a lechour, and an idolaster, And in his eld he very God forsook. And if that God had not (as saith the book) Spared him for his father’s sake, he should Have lost his regnë rather than he would. I settë not, of all the villainy That he of women wrote, a butterfly. I am a woman, needës must