No More Learning

Let him who will, by force or fraud innate,
Of courtly grandeurs gain the slippery height;
I, leaving not the home of my delight,
Far from the world and noise will meditate.
Then, without pomps or perils of the great,
I shall behold the day succeed the night;
Behold the alternate seasons take their flight,
And in serene repose old age await.
And so, whenever Death shall come to close
The happy moments that my days compose,
I, full of years, shall die, obscure, alone!
How wretched is the man, with honors crowned,
Who, having not the one thing needful found,
Dies, known to all, but to himself unknown.



THE WINE OF JURANCON

BY CHARLES CORAN

Little sweet wine of Jurancon,
You are dear to my memory still!
With mine host and his merry song,
Under the rose-tree I drank my fill.

Twenty years after, passing that way,
Under the trellis I found again
Mine host, still sitting there au frais,
And singing still the same refrain.

The Jurancon, so fresh and bold,
Treats me as one it used to know;
Souvenirs of the days of old
Already from the bottle flow,

With glass in hand our glances met;
We pledge, we drink. How sour it is
Never Argenteuil piquette
Was to my palate sour as this!

And yet the vintage was good, in sooth;
The self-same juice, the self-same cask!
It was you, O gayety of my youth,
That failed in the autumnal flask!



FRIAR LUBIN

BY CLEMENT MAROT

To gallop off to town post-haste,
So oft, the times I cannot tell;
To do vile deed, nor feel disgraced,--
Friar Lubin will do it well.
But a sober life to lead,
To honor virtue, and pursue it,
That's a pious, Christian deed,--
Friar Lubin can not do it.

To mingle, with a knowing smile,
The goods of others with his own,
And leave you without cross or pile,
Friar Lubin stands alone.
To say 't is yours is all in vain,
If once he lays his finger to it;
For as to giving back again,
Friar Lubin cannot do it.
With flattering words and gentle tone,
To woo and win some guileless maid,
Cunning pander need you none,--
Friar Lubin knows the trade.
Loud preacheth he sobriety,
But as for water, doth eschew it;
Your dog may drink it,--but not he;
Friar Lubin cannot do it.

ENVOY
When an evil deed 's to do
Friar Lubin is stout and true;
Glimmers a ray of goodness through it,
Friar Lubin cannot do it.



RONDEL

BY JEAN FROISSART

Love, love, what wilt thou with this heart of mine?
Naught see I fixed or sure in thee!
I do not know thee,--nor what deeds are thine:
Love, love, what wilt thou with this heart of mine?
Naught see I fixed or sure in thee!

Shall I be mute, or vows with prayers combine?
Ye who are blessed in loving, tell it me:
Love, love, what wilt thou with this heart of mine?
Naught see I permanent or sure in thee!



MY SECRET

BY FELIX ARVERS

My soul its secret has, my life too has its mystery,
A love eternal in a moment's space conceived;
Hopeless the evil is, I have not told its history,
And she who was the cause nor knew it nor believed.
Alas! I shall have passed close by her unperceived,
Forever at her side, and yet forever lonely,
I shall unto the end have made life's journey, only
Daring to ask for naught, and having naught received.
For her, though God has made her gentle and endearing,
She will go on her way distraught and without hearing
These murmurings of love that round her steps ascend,
Piously faithful still unto her austere duty,
Will say, when she shall read these lines full of her beauty,
"Who can this woman be? " and will not comprehend.



FROM THE ITALIAN

THE CELESTIAL PILOT

PURGATORIO II.