Ne
any is that may him now restrain,
He growen is so great and strong of late,
Barking and biting all that him do bait,1
Albe they worthy blame, or clear of crime;
Ne spareth he most learned Wits to rate,
Ne spareth he the gentle Poet's rhyme;
But rends, without regard of person or of time.
Ne may this homely verse, of many meanest,
Hope to escape his venomous despite,
More than my former writs, all2 were they cleanest 2 Al-
From blameful blot, and free from all that wite 3
With which some wicked tongues did it backbite,
And bring into a mighty peer's* displeasure,
That never so deserved to endite.4
Therefore do you, my rhymes, keep better measure,
And seek to please; that now is counted wise men's
* 'Mighty peer:' supposed to be the Lord Treasurer Burleigh, who is known to have been unfriendly to the poet.
WHICH, BOTH FOR FORM AND MATTER, APPEAR TO BE PARCEL OF SOME
FOLLOWING BOOK OF
Proud Change (not pleas'd in mortal things
Beneath the moon to reign)
Pretends, as well of gods as men,
To be the sovereign.
WHAT man that sees the ever-whirling wheel
Of Change, the which all mortal things doth sway.
But that thereby doth find, and plainly feel,
How Mutability in them doth play
Her cruel sports to many men's decay?1
Which that to all may better yet appear,
I will rehearse, that whilome2 I heard say,
How she at first herself began to rear
[to bear.
Gainst all the gods, and th' empire sought from them
*These two cantos, and the fragment of the third, were not published during Spenser's life. They first appeared in the folio edition of the 'Faery Queen,' published in 1609, which contains no preface or explanation.
But first, here falleth fittest to unfold
Her antique race and lineage ancient,
As I have found it register'd of old
In Faery Land mongst records permanent.
She was, to wit, a daughter by descent
Of those old Titans that did whilome strive
With Saturn's son for heaven's regiment; 1
Whom though high Jove of kingdom did deprive,
Yet many of their stem2 long after did survive:
And many of them afterwards obtain'd
Great power of Jove, and high authority:
As Hecate, in whose almighty hand
He plac'd all rule and principality,
To be by her disposéd diversly
To gods and men, as she them list divide:
And dread Bellona, that doth sound on high
Wars and alarums unto nations wide,
That makes both heav'n and earth to tremble at her
So likewise did this Titaness aspire
Rule and dominion to herself to gain;
That as a goddess men might her admire,
And heav'nly honours yield, as to them twain:
And first, on earth she sought it to obtain;
Where she such proof and sad examples shew'd
Of her great power, to many one's great pain,
That not men only (whom she soon subdu'd)
But eke all other creatures her bad doings ru'd.3
For she the face of earthly things so chang'd,
That all which Nature had establish'd first
In good estate, and in meet order rang'd,
She did pervert, and all their statutes burst:
And all the world's fair frame (which none yet durst
Of gods or men to alter or misguide)
She alter'd quite; and made them all accurst
That God had bless'd, and did at first provide
In that still happy state for ever to abide.
Ne she the laws of Nature only brake,
But eke of Justice, and of Policy;
And wrong of right, and bad of good did make,
And death for life exchangéd foolishly:
Since which, all living wights have learn'd to die,
And all this world is waxen daily worse.
O piteous work of Mutability,
By which we all are subject to that curse,
And death, instead of life, have suckéd from our
And now, when all the earth she thus had brought
To her behest and thralléd to her might,
She gan to cast in her ambitious thought
T'attempt the empire of the heaven's height,
And Jove himself to shoulder from his right.
And first, she pass'd the region of the air
And of the fire, whose substance thin and slight
Made no resistance, ne could her contrair,1
But ready passage to her pleasure did prepare.
Thence to the circle of the Moon she clamb,
Where Cynthia reigns in everlasting glory,
To whose bright shining palace straight she came,
All fairly deck'd with heaven's goodly story;
Whose silver gates (by which there sat an hoary
Old aged Sire, with hower2-glass in hand,
Hight Time,) she enter'd, were he lief or sorry Ne staid till she the highest stage had scann'd,2 Where Cynthia did sit, that never still did stand.
Her sitting on an iv'ry throne she found,
Drawn of two steeds, th' one black, the other white,
Environ'd with ten thousand stars around,
That duly her attended day and night;
And by her side there ran her page, that hight
Vesper, whom we the evening-star intend; 3
That with his torch, still twinkling like twilight,
Her lighten'd all the way where she should wend,
And joy to weary wand'ring travellers did lend:
That when the hardy Titaness beheld
The goodly building of her palace bright,
Made of the heavens' substance, and upheld
With thousand crystal pillars of huge height;
She gan to burn in her ambitious sprite,
And t'envy her that in such glory reign'd.
Eftsoons she cast by force and tortious might
Her to displace, and to herself t' have gain'd
The kingdom of the Night, and waters by her wan'd.*6
Boldly she bid the goddess down descend,
And let herself into that ivory throne;
For she herself more worthy thereof wen'd,"
And better able it to guide alone;
Whether to men whose fall she did bemoan,
Or unto gods whose state she did malign,
Or to th' infernal powers her need give loan
Of her fair light and bounty most benign,
Herself of all that rule she deeméd most condign.8
'Waned: an allusion to the influence of the moon in producing the
1 Willing
or un
willing. 2 Climbed.
• Immediately. 5 Wrong. ful.
• Diminished.
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