Page:King Alfred's Version of the Consolations of Boethius.djvu/52

xliv Book iv, prose 2. 'Yf any man then that can go, and an other to whom the natmall propertie of the feete is wanting, stryving with his handes, stryves so to walke, which of these ij suppose you more worth?' 'Perform the rest if that you will, for no man doutes but he is more of force that hath the vse of nature, than he that wantes it' 'But the greatest good,' said she, ' that is set before yll and good, the good desyre by naturall duty of vertue, the other by a scatterd desyre, and stryue to get that which is no proper gift, to such as will obtayne the greatest good. Dost thou think the contrary?' 'No,' quoth I, ' for that is playne that followes. For heerby may we gather that I graunted afore, good men to be mighty, and yll men weake.' 'Rightly hast thou discourst. And so, as phisicians ought to hope, that it is a signe of a helthy and Resisting Nature.'

The next version, written by a certain 'J. T.,' was printed in London in 1609 for Matthew Lownes, as the title-page tells us. The book' is dedicated to the Countess of Dorset. The metres are in tersa rima.

Book iii, metr. 2.

Then