At the same time, there is much about the piece that is vague, shifty, and unsatisfactory. He is too full of excuses, and too plausible; in a word, too selfish. Hence he has no real message for others, but only wishes to display his skill, which he does by help of the most barefaced and deliberate plagiarism. It was not from the Consolatio Philosophiae of Boethius, but from the English translation of that work by Chaucer, that he really drew his materials; and he often takes occasion to lift lines or ideas from the poem of Troilus whenever he can find any that come in handy. In one place he turns a long passage from the House of Fame into very inferior prose. There are one or two passages that remind us of the Legend of Good Women (i. pr. 100, ii. 3. 38, iii. 7. 38); but they are remarkably few. But he keeps a copy of Chaucer's Boethius always open before him, and takes from it passage after passage, usually with many alterations, abbreviations, expansions, and other disfigurements; but sometimes without any alteration at all. A few examples will suffice, as a large number of parallel passages are duly pointed out in the Notes. § 11. In Chaucer's Boethius (bk. i. pr. 3. 10), when Philosophy, the heavenly visitant, comes to comfort the writer, her first words are:--'_O my norry_, sholde I forsaken thee now?' In the Testament (p. 10, l. 37), Heavenly Love commences her consolations with the same exclamation:--'_O my nory_, wenest thou that my maner be, to foryete my frendes or my servaunts?' The Latin text--'An te, _alumne_, desererem?'--does not suggest this remarkable mode of address. This, however, is a mere beginning; it is not till further on that plagiarisms begin to be frequent. At first, as at p. 37, the author copies the sense rather than the words; but he gradually begins to copy words and phrases also. Thus, at p. 43, l. 38, his '_chayres_ of domes' comes from Chaucer's 'heye _chayres_' in bk. i. met. 5. 27; and then, in the next line, we find '_vertue, shynende naturelly ... is hid_ under cloude,' where Chaucer has '_vertu_, cler-_shyninge naturelly is hid_ in derke derknesses'; bk. i. met. 5. 28. At p. 44, l. 66, we have: '_Whan nature brought thee forth_, come thou not _naked out of thy moders wombe_? Thou haddest no richesse'; where Chaucer has: '_Whan_ that _nature broughte thee forth out of thy moder wombe_, I receyved thee _naked_, and nedy of alle thinges'; bk. ii. pr. 2. 10. Just a few lines below (ll. 71-76) we have the sense, but not the words, of the neighbouring passage in Chaucer (ll. 23-25). Further literal imitations are pointed out in the Notes to l. 85 in the same chapter, and elsewhere. See, for example, the Notes to Book ii. ch. iv. 4, 14, 20, 61; ch. v. 15, 57, 65, 67, 79; ch. vi. 11, 30, 74, 117, 123, 129, 132, 143; ch. vii. 8, 14, 20, 23, 30, 39, 50, 74, 95, 98, 105, 109, 114, 117, 130, 135, 139, 148; &c. Those who require conviction on this point may take such an example as this.