 | Liberalitie and Prodigalitie |  |
SCENE III.
Enter Vertue and Equity.Vertue.
Oh most vnhappie state, of rechlesse humane kinde!
Oh dangerous race of man, vnwitty, fond, and blinde!
Oh wretched worldlings, subiect to all misery,
When fortune is the proppe of your prosperitie!
Can you so soone forget, that you haue learn'd of yore,
The graue diuine precepts, the sacred wholsome lore,
That wise Philosophers, with painefull industry
Had written and pronounst, for mans felicitie?
Whilome hath bin taught that fortunes hold is tickle,
She beares a double face, disguised, false, and fickle,
Full fraughted with all sleights, she playeth on the pack,
On whom she smileth most, she turneth most to wracke.
The time hath bin, when vertue had the soueraignety
Of greatest price, and plaste in chiefest dignity:
But topsie-turuy now, the world is turn'd about:
Proud Fortune is preferd, poore Vertue cleane thrust out:
Mans sence so dulled is, so all things come to passe,
Equity.
Madam, haue patience, dame Vertue must sustaine,
Vntill the heauenly powers doe otherwise ordaine.
Ver.
Equity, for my part, I enuy not her state,
Nor yet mislike the meannesse of my simple rate.
But what the heauens assigne, that doe I still thinke best:
My fame was neuer yet, by Fortunes frowne opprest:
Here therefore will I rest, in this my homely bowre,
With patience to abide the stormes of euery showre.
Exit.
| Liberalitie and Prodigalitie | |