Page:Romance of the Rose (Ellis), volume 2.pdf/192

164

The prime exemplar of a book

So vile that by the devil’s crook

It well were written, and about

’Twas set for clerks to copy out

And circulate when duly dight;

The everlasting Gospel hight

This trash and friars avouched its merit,

As writ by God’s most Holy Spirit.

Right worthy was it to be burned,

But many a crown the scholars earned

Before the Church of Notre Dame,

For men and women oiled the palm,

Of those who set themselves to write

Out fair, that vile misleading light.

Therein one finds all clearly done

This blasphemous comparison:

“E’en as before the sun doth fail

The moon, and show but faint and pale,

And as she nowise can compete

With him in brilliancy or heat,

And as a kernel to its shell

(Nay do not smile at what I tell,

For this have I seen writ, I swear)

So doth this wondrous book compare

With Christ’s Four Gospels, and surpass

Their value utterly.”—Alas!

I wish me dead, if even than these

You find not bolder similes.

The University till then

Had been asleep, but roused it when

This blasphemy assailed its ears,

Wakened at once by wrath and fears.