For that which all men then did vertue call, iv Is now cald vice; and that which vice was hight, Is now hight vertue, and so vs’d of all: Right now is wrong, and wrong that was is right, As all things else in time are chaunged quight. Ne wonder; for the heauens reuolution Is wandred farre from[241] where it first was pight, And so doe make contrarie constitution Of all this lower world, toward his dissolution. For who so list into the heauens looke, v And search the courses of the rowling spheares, Shall find that from the point, where they first tooke Their setting forth[242], in these few thousand yeares They all are wandred much; that plaine appeares. For that same golden fleecy Ram, which bore _Phrixus_ and _Helle_ from their stepdames feares, Hath now forgot, where he was plast of yore, And shouldred hath the Bull, which fayre _Europa_ bore. And eke the Bull hath with his bow-bent horne vi So hardly butted those two twinnes of _Ioue_, That they haue crusht the Crab, and quite him borne Into the great _Nemæan_ lions groue. So now all range, and doe at randon roue Out of their proper places farre away, And all this world with them amisse doe moue, And all his creatures from their course astray, Till they arriue at their last ruinous decay. Ne is that same great glorious lampe of light, vii That doth enlumine all these lesser fyres, In better case, ne keepes his course more right, But is miscaried with the other Spheres. For since the terme of fourteene hundred yeres, That learned _Ptolomæe_ his hight did take, He is declyned from that marke of theirs, Nigh thirtie minutes to the Southerne lake; That makes me feare in time he will vs quite forsake. And if to those Ægyptian wisards old, viii Which in Star-read were wont haue best insight, Faith may be giuen, it is by them told, That since the time they first tooke the Sunnes hight, Foure times his place he shifted hath in sight, And twice hath risen, where he now doth West, And wested twice, where he ought rise aright. But most is _Mars_ amisse of all the rest, And next to him old _Saturne_, that was wont be best. For during _Saturnes_ ancient raigne it’s sayd, ix That all the world with goodnesse did abound: All loued vertue, no man was affrayd Of force, ne fraud in wight was to be found: No warre was knowne, no dreadfull trompets sound, Peace vniuersall rayn’d mongst men and beasts, And all things freely grew out of the ground: Iustice sate high ador’d with solemne feasts, And to all people did diuide her dred beheasts.