[Sidenote: Have some recreation.] It is conueniente for euery man, of what degree that he be of, to haue playe & game accordynge to his degree. [Sidenote: Dionysius Cato, Distich. iii. 7.] For Cato sayth, _Interpone tuis interdum gaudia curis_: Amonge thy charges and busynes thou muste haue sometyme ioye 4 and myrthe; but nowe a-dayes it is doone ferre aboue [Sidenote: Poor men now play too high.] measure. For nowe a poore man in regarde wyll playe as great game, at all maner games, as gentylman were wont to do, or greater, and gentilmen as lordes, and 8 lordes as prynces, & ofte tymes the great estates wyll call gentylmen or yomen to play with them at as great game as they do, and they call it a disport, the whiche [Sidenote: [Fol. 69.]] me semeth a very trewe name to it, for it displeaseth 12 some of them er they departe, and specyall god, for myspendynge of his goodes and tyme. But if they [Sidenote: If men played for less, it might then be called play.] played smalle games, that the poore man that playeth myght beare it thoughe he loste, and bate not his 16 countenaunce, than myght it be called a good game, a good playe, a good sporte, and a pastyme. But whan one shall lose vpon a day, or vpon a nyght, as moche money as wold fynde hym and all his house meate and 20 drynke a moneth or a quarter of a yere or more, that maye be well called a disporte, or a displeasure, and ofte [Sidenote: But now men lose their lands and become thieves.] tymes, by the meanes therof, it causeth theym to sell theyr landes, dysheryte the heyres, and may fortune to fall to 24 thefte, robbery, or suche other, to the great hurte of them-selfe, & of theyr chyldren, and to the displeasure of god: and they so doinge, lyttel do they pondre or regarde the saying of saynt Paule; _Iuxta facultates faciendi sunt 28 sumptus, ne longi temporis victum breuis hora consumat_: [Sidenote: Play, begun in love, ends in wrath.] This play begun with loue and charity, and oft times it endeth with couetous wrath and enuy. And this me thynketh shoulde be a sufficient instruction for kepynge 32 of measure. 154. ¶ A prologue of the thyrde sayinge of the philosopher.