Who phisicke doth professe, he is not voyde of care: But churchmen they be blest, they turne a leafe or two, They sometime sing a psalme, and for the people pray, For which they honour haue, and sit in highest place: What can they wishe or seeke, that is not hard at hande? They labour not at al, they knowe no kinde of payne, No daunger dooth with dreade their happy liues distresse, Ceasse you therefore to muse what madnesse made me leaue The courte and courtly pompe of wearing royal crowne, No madnesse did that deede, but wisedome wisht it so, I gayn’d thereby the blesse which few before me felt: I niene yeares led my life, and neuer felt annoy: And certaynely if nowe I might be king agayne, Refusing all that pompe, I woulde become a priest, A deacon, or a deane, prebende, or minister: For these men leade their liues with liuings two or three. Some haue their substitutes in vniuersities, Some leade the brauest liues that any man may haue, They feede vppon the fleece, they force not of the flocke: Three houres in the yere, with beastly bosomde stuffe They spend, and that is all that lawe of them requires: Muse not though many thrust and shoulder for degrees, For happy man is he, who hath a preacher’s fees: But let me nowe returne vnto my _Romishe_ rout, Who fed like bacon fat, did nought but play and pray. With whom for niene yeares space, when I my life had led, I songe my _requiem_, and payde the earth her fee. Then in Saint _Peter’s_ church at _Rome_ they did me lay, Booted and spur’d, euen as you see me here this day: So now you haue the whole of al my tragedye: Of _Brutus_ bloode the last I liude that rulde as king: My _Britaines_ driuen to _Wales_ they _Welchmen_ then were calde, And I at _Rome_ their king, a mumbling monke instal’d: The _Saxons_ had the day, for which they longed long: They _England_ calde the ile of _Brute_, which tooke her name. Some men be borne to blisse, and some to hatefull happe: Who would haue thought, that I in warre a raging kyng, Should by the force of fate, at _Rome_ haue dide a monke? Let al the worlde then know, that nothing is so sure, That can affoorde and say, I thus wyl aye indure: For that which seemeth best, is soonest brought to naught, Which playnely doth appeare by that which I haue taught: The worthiest in the worlde, princes, philosophers, Will teach that I haue taught, and proue it passing playne: _Paulus Aemilius_ did dye but wretchedly: And was not _Scipio_ euen to his dying day Constraynde, to helpe his neede, the painfull plowe to plye? _Cæsar_ and _Silla_ both, did not they tast the whyppe? And made not _Hannibal_ a miserable end? And how was _Socrates_ before his tyme destroyed, And _Anaxagoras_ inprisoned long with paine? For cruel beastly coyne diuine _Plato_ was soulde,