Double Ballad to the Like Purport

Serve love and ladies day and night,
Frequenting feasts and revelries ;
You'll get nor profit nor delight,
But only broken beads and sighs :
Light loves make asses of the wise,
As witness Solomon, God wot ;
And Samson thereby lost his eyes.
Happy is he who knows them not.

Orpheus, tie minstrel fair and wight,
That fluted in such dulcet guise,
Did hardly 'scape the deadly bite
Of Cerberus, in love's emprise ;
Narcissus did so idolize
His own fair favour, that (poor sot)
He drowned himself, as none denies.
Happy is he who knows them not.

Sardana also, the good knight,
That conquered Crete, did disguise
Him as a wench and so bedight,
Span among maids ; and on like wise
David the king, for palliardize,
The fear of God awhile forgot
At sight of white well-shapen thighs.
Happy is he who knows them not.

And David's son, that Ammon bight,
Deflowered his sister, for with lies,
Feigning desire for manchets white,
Incest most foul he did devise ;
And Herod (history testifies)
Paid with John Baptist's head the scot
For a girl's dancing deviltries.
Happy is he who knows them not.

And even I, poor silly wight,
Was beaten as linen is that lies
In washers' tubs for hats to smite ;
And who gat me this sour surprise
But Vaucel's Kate, the cockatrice ?
And No'el, too, his good share got
Of cuff's at those festivities.
Happy is he who knows them not.

And yet before a young man might
Be brought to leave this merchandise,
Be brought to leave this merchandise,
Witch-like that on a besom flies.
Above all, wenches doth he prize :
But there's no trusting them a jot ;
Blonde or brunette, this rhyme applies,
Happy is he who knows them not.