THE COMPLAINT OF A RUSTIC THAT THE CLERGY AND PEOPLE ARE AT WAR.
What can it avail
To drive forth a snail?
Or to make a sail
Of an herring's tail?
To rhyme or to rail,
To write or to indite,
Either for delight,
Or else for despite,
Or books to compile
Of divers manner style
Vice to revile
And sin to exile?...
Say this, and say that :1-
"His head is so fat,
He wotteth never what,
Nor whereof, he speaketh :
He crieth and he creaketh,
He pryeth and he peeketh,
He chides and he chatters,
He prates and he patters,
He clitters and he clatters,
He meddles and he smatters,
He gloses and he flatters.”
Or, if he speak plain,
Then,-" He lacketh brain,
He is but a fool,
Let him go to school!"
And, if ye stand in doubt
Who brought this about,
My name is Colin Clout:
For, as far as I can see,
It is wrong with each degree:1
For the Temporalty
Accuseth the Spiritualty;
The Spiritual again
Doth grudge and complain
Upon temporal men.
Thus each of other blother 2
The t'one against the t'other;
Alas, they make me shudder!
For in hudder-mudder
The Church is put in faute;
The Prelates been so haut,
They say, and look so high
As though they would fly
Above the starry sky....
The Temporalty say plain
How Bishops disdain
Sermons for to make,
Or such labour to take.
And, for to say troth,
A great part is for sloth;
But the greatest part
Is for they have but small art,
And right slender cunning
Within their heads wonning....
Thus I, Colin Clout,
As I go about,
And wandering as I walk,
I hear the people talk.
For Thrift is threadbare worn,
Our sheep are shrewdly1 torn,
And Truth is all to-torn ; 2
Wisdom is laughed to scorn. . . .
Will, will, will, will,
He ruleth alway still;
Good Reason and Good Skill,
They may garlic pill,
Carry sacks to the mill,
Or peascods they may shill,
Or else go roast a stone!
There is no man but one3
That hath the strokes alone.
Be it black or white,
All that he doth is right;
As right as a cammock crooked!".
He is set so high
In his hierarchy
Of frantic frenèsie 5
And foolish fantasie,
That in the Chamber of Stars 6
All matters there he mars,
Clapping his rod on the board:
No man dare speak a word,
For he hath all the saying
Without any re-naying;7
He rolleth in his records;
He saith, "How say ye, my lords?
Is not my reason good?"
(Good even, good Robin Hood !)8
Some say "yes," and some
Sit still as they were dumb.
Thus, thwarting over them,
He ruleth all the roast
With bragging and with boast,
Borne up on every side
With pomp and with pride,
With "trump up, hallelujah!"10...
Our Barons be so bold,
Into a mouse-hole they wold
Run away and creep;
Like a meinie 11 of sheep,
8 An aside of contempt.
10 Pompous church-services.
9 Perversely controlling, domineering. 11 Company.
1 In allusion to
4 Potsherds.
8 Blood-royal.
Dare not look out at door
For dread of the mastiff cur,
For dread of the butcher's dog1
Would worry them like an hog.
For, and this Cur do gnar,2
They must stand all afar,
To hold up their hand at the bar.
For all their noble blood,
He plucks them by the hood,
And shakes them by the ear,
And brings them in such fear:
He baiteth them like a bear,
Like an ox or a bull:
Their wits, he saith, are dull;
He saith they have no brain
Their estate to maintain,
And maketh them to bow their knee
Before his majesty. . . .
But this mad Amalek,
Like to a Mamelek,3
He regardeth lords
No more than potshords.1
He is in such elation
Of his exaltation,
And the supportation
Of our sovereign lord,5
That, God to record,
He ruleth all at will
Without reason or skill;
How be it, the primordial
Of his wretched original,
And his base progeny,
And his greasy genealogy,
He came of the sang-royal
That was cast out of a butcher's stall....
Such a prelate I trow
Were worthy to row
Through the straits of Maroc 9
To the gibbet of Baldoc ;1
He would dry up the streams
Of nine kings' realms,
All rivers and wells,
All water that swells;
Wolsey's reputed descent.
5 The king's patronage.
9 Straits of Morocco.
6 God to witness.
10 A city of Chaldea.
For with us he so mells1
That within England dwells,
I would he were somewhere else;
For else, by and bye,
He will drink us so dry,
And suck us so nigh,
That men shall scantly
Have penny or halfpenny.
God save his noble grace,
And grant him a place
Endless to dwell
With the Devil of Hell !
For, and he were there
We need never fear
Of the fiendès black;
For I undertake
He would so brag and crake2
That he would then make
The devils to quake,
To shudder and to shake,
Like a fire-drake ;3
And with a coal-rake
Bruise them on a break,1
And bind them to a stake,
And set Hell on fire
At his own desire.
He is such a grim sire,
And such a potestolate,5
And such a potestate,
That he would break the brains
Of Lucifer in his chains,
And rule them each one
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