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And thereto gave he me that gift

Of speech, which man o’er brutes doth lift,

But to thy folly doth appear

More comely as it grows less clear.

Thou good authority mayst find

For that I say, if so inclinèd,

For, in his school, great Plato said,

That God the gift of talking shed

On man that, learning, he might teach

Others, and greater learning reach.

This proverb which I set in rhyme,

Was taught by Plato in old time

(Than whom ne’er lived more witful wight)

Within the book Timæus hight.

And since a word thou tak’st to task

I used erewhile, I dare to ask

Before the face of God, if I

Perchance had called Jove’s cullions by

The name of relics, and had named

Saints’ relics cullions, hadst thou blamed

That name and straightway wouldst thou find

Relics in no degree behind

The other as a blameful word?

’Twas I who gave the names which stirred

Your anger, and they are to me

Devoid all taint of ribaldry.

One’s free to use such words, i’faith,

Yet rest assured that nought he saith

To reprehend. Now if I’d named

The cullions relics, nought ashamed

Thou’dst been thereat, but hadst been fired

With approbation, and admired