Canterbury Tales and Other Poems, Geoffrey Chaucer [good fiction books to read txt] 📗

promises of further disclosures. The poem, not least in the passages the omission of which has been dictated by the exigencies of the present volume, is full of testimony to the vast acquaintance of Chaucer with learning ancient and modern; Ovid, Virgil, Statius, are equally at his command to illustrate his narrative or to furnish the groundwork of his descriptions; while architecture, the Arabic numeration, the theory of sound, and the effects of gunpowder, are only a few among the topics of his own time of which the poet treats with the ease of proficient knowledge.

Not least interesting are the vivid touches in which Chaucer sketches the routine of his laborious and almost recluse daily life; while the strength, individuality, and humour that mark the didactic portion of the poem prove that “The House of Fame”

was one of the poet’s riper productions.]

 

GOD turn us ev’ry dream to good!

For it is wonder thing, by the Rood, Cross <1>

To my witte, what causeth swevens, dreams Either on morrows or on evens;

And why th’effect followeth of some,

And of some it shall never come;

Why this is an avision

And this a revelation;

Why this a dream, why that a sweven,

And not to ev’ry man *like even;* alike

Why this a phantom, why these oracles, I n’ot; but whoso of these miracles

The causes knoweth bet than I,

Divine* he; for I certainly define Ne can them not,* nor ever think do not know them

To busy my wit for to swink labour To know of their significance

The genders, neither the distance

Of times of them, nor the causes

For why that this more than that cause is; Or if folke’s complexions

Make them dream of reflections;

Or elles thus, as others sayn,

For too great feebleness of the brain

By abstinence, or by sickness,

By prison, strife, or great distress,

Or elles by disordinance derangement Of natural accustomance; mode of life That some men be too curious

In study, or melancholious,

Or thus, so inly full of dread,

That no man may them *boote bede; afford them relief*

Or elles that devotion

Of some, and contemplation,

Causeth to them such dreames oft;

Or that the cruel life unsoft

Of them that unkind loves lead,

That often hope much or dread,

That purely their impressions

Cause them to have visions;

Or if that spirits have the might

To make folk to dream a-night;

Or if the soul, of *proper kind, its own nature*

Be so perfect as men find,

That it forewot* what is to come, *foreknows And that it warneth all and some

Of ev’reach of their adventures,

By visions, or by figures,

But that our fleshe hath no might

To understanden it aright,

For it is warned too darkly;

But why the cause is, not wot I.

Well worth of this thing greate clerks, <2>

That treat of this and other works;

For I of none opinion

Will as now make mention;

But only that the holy Rood

Turn us every dream to good.

For never since that I was born,

Nor no man elles me beforn,

Mette,* as I trowe steadfastly, *dreamed So wonderful a dream as I,

The tenthe day now of December;

The which, as I can it remember,

I will you tellen ev’ry deal. whit But at my beginning, truste weel, well I will make invocation,

With special devotion,

Unto the god of Sleep anon,

That dwelleth in a cave of stone, <3>

Upon a stream that comes from Lete,

That is a flood of hell unsweet,

Beside a folk men call Cimmerie;

There sleepeth ay this god unmerry,

With his sleepy thousand sones,

That alway for to sleep their won* is; wont, custom And to this god, that I of read, tell of*

Pray I, that he will me speed

My sweven for to tell aright,

If ev’ry dream stands in his might.

And he that Mover is of all

That is, and was, and ever shall,

So give them joye that it hear,

Of alle that they dream to-year; this year And for to standen all in grace favour Of their loves, or in what place

That them were liefest* for to stand, *most desired And shield them from povert’ and shand, shame And from ev’ry unhap and disease,

And send them all that may them please, That take it well, and scorn it not,

Nor it misdeemen* in their thought, *misjudge Through malicious intention;

And whoso, through presumption.

Or hate, or scorn, or through envy,

Despite, or jape,* or villainy, *jesting Misdeem it, pray I Jesus God,

That dream he barefoot, dream he shod, That ev’ry harm that any man

Hath had since that the world began,

Befall him thereof, ere he sterve, die And grant that he may it deserve, earn, obtain Lo! with such a conclusion

As had of his avision

Croesus, that was the king of Lyde,<4>

That high upon a gibbet died;

This prayer shall he have of me;

I am *no bet in charity. no more charitable*

 

Now hearken, as I have you said,

What that I mette ere I abraid, awoke Of December the tenthe day;

When it was night to sleep I lay,

Right as I was wont for to do’n,

And fell asleepe wonder soon,

As he that *weary was for go*<5> was weary from going

On pilgrimage miles two

To the corsaint* Leonard, *relics of <6>

To make lithe that erst was hard.

But, as I slept, me mette I was

Within a temple made of glass;

In which there were more images

Of gold, standing in sundry stages,

And more riche tabernacles,

And with pierrie* more pinnacles, *gems And more curious portraitures,

And *quainte manner* of figures strange kinds

Of golde work, than I saw ever.

But, certainly, I wiste* never *knew Where that it was, but well wist I

It was of Venus readily,

This temple; for in portraiture

I saw anon right her figure

Naked floating in a sea, <7>

And also on her head, pardie,

Her rose garland white and red,

And her comb to comb her head,

Her doves, and Dan Cupido,

Her blinde son, and Vulcano, <8>

That in his face was full brown.

 

As he “roamed up and down,” the dreamer saw on the wall a tablet of brass inscribed with the opening lines of the Aeneid; while the whole story of Aeneas was told in the “portraitures”

and gold work. About three hundred and fifty lines are devoted to the description; but they merely embody Virgil’s account of Aeneas’ adventures from the destruction of Troy to his arrival in Italy; and the only characteristic passage is the following reflection, suggested by the death of Dido for her perfidious but fate-compelled guest:

 

Lo! how a woman doth amiss,

To love him that unknowen is!

For, by Christ, lo! thus it fareth,

It is not all gold that glareth. glitters For, all so brook I well my head,

There may be under goodlihead fair appearance Cover’d many a shrewed* vice; *cursed Therefore let no wight be so nice foolish To take a love only for cheer, looks Or speech, or for friendly mannere;

For this shall ev’ry woman find,

That some man, *of his pure kind, by force of his nature Will showen outward the fairest,

Till he have caught that which him lest; pleases And then anon will causes find,

And sweare how she is unkind,

Or false, or privy* double was. secretly All this say I by Aeneas with reference to And Dido, and her nice lest, foolish pleasure*

That loved all too soon a guest;

Therefore I will say a proverb,

That he that fully knows the herb

May safely lay it to his eye;

Withoute dread,* this is no lie. *doubt When the dreamer had seen all the sights in the temple, he became desirous to know who had worked all those wonders, and in what country he was; so he resolved to go out at the wicket, in search of somebody who might tell him.

 

When I out at the doores came,

I fast aboute me beheld;

Then saw I but a large feld, open country As far as that I mighte see,

WIthoute town, or house, or tree,

Or bush, or grass, or ered* land, *ploughed <9>

For all the field was but of sand,

As small* as men may see it lie *fine In the desert of Libye;

Nor no manner creature

That is formed by Nature,

There saw I, me to *rede or wiss. advise or direct*

“O Christ!” thought I, “that art in bliss, From *phantom and illusion vain fancy and deception*

Me save!” and with devotion

Mine eyen to the heav’n I cast.

Then was I ware at the last

That, faste by the sun on high,

As kennen might I with mine eye, as well as I might discern

Me thought I saw an eagle soar,

But that it seemed muche more larger Than I had any eagle seen;

This is as sooth as death, certain,

It was of gold, and shone so bright,

That never saw men such a sight,

But if* the heaven had y-won, *unless All new from God, another sun;

So shone the eagle’s feathers bright:

And somewhat downward gan it light. descend, alight The Second Book opens with a brief invocation of Venus and of Thought; then it proceeds:

 

This eagle, of which I have you told,

That shone with feathers as of gold,

Which that so high began to soar,

I gan beholde more and more,

To see her beauty and the wonder;

But never was there dint of thunder,

Nor that thing that men calle foudre, thunderbolt That smote sometimes a town to powder, And in his swifte coming brenn’d, burned That so swithe* gan descend, *rapidly As this fowl, when that it beheld

That I a-roam was in the feld;

And with his grim pawes strong,

Within his sharpe nailes long,

Me, flying, at a swap* he hent,* swoop *seized And with his sours <10> again up went, Me carrying in his clawes stark strong As light as I had been a lark,

How high, I cannot telle you,

For I came up, I wist not how.

 

The poet faints through bewilderment and fear; but the eagle, speaking with the voice of a man, recalls him to himself, and comforts him by the assurance that what now befalls him is for his instruction and profit. Answering the poet’s unspoken inquiry whether he is not to die otherwise, or whether Jove will him stellify, the eagle says that he has been sent by Jupiter out of his “great ruth,”

 

“For that thou hast so truely

So long served ententively with attentive zeal His blinde nephew* Cupido, *grandson And faire Venus also,

Withoute guuerdon ever yet,

And natheless hast set thy wit

(Although that in thy head full lite* is) *little To make bookes, songs, and ditties,

In rhyme or elles in cadence,

As thou best canst, in reverence

Of Love, and of his servants eke,

That have his service sought, and seek, And pained thee to praise his art,

Although thou haddest never part; <11>

Wherefore, all so God me bless,

Jovis holds it great humbless,

And virtue eke, that thou wilt make

A-night full oft thy head to ache,

In thy study so thou writest,

And evermore of love enditest,

In honour of him and praisings,

And in his folke’s furtherings,

And in their matter all devisest, relates And not him nor his folk despisest,

Although thou may’st go in the dance