--he that winketh when he should see Al wilfully God let him never the. Nay, quoth the Fox, but God give him mischance That is so indiscreet of governance, That jangleth when that he should hold his peace. ] THE MORAL. In this plain fable you the effect may see Of negligence, and fond credulity: And learn besides of flatterers to beware, Then most pernicious when they speak too fair. The cock and fox, the fool and knave imply; The truth is moral, though the tale a lie. Who spoke in parables, I dare not say; } But sure he knew it was a pleasing way, } Sound sense, by plain example, to convey. } And in a heathen author we may find, } That pleasure with instruction should be joined; } So take the corn, and leave the chaff behind. } THE FLOWER AND THE LEAF. The argument of this piece, as given by the editors of Chaucer, runs thus:-- "_A gentlewoman, out of an arbour, in a grove, seeth a great company of knights and ladies in a dance, upon the green grass. The which being ended, they all kneel down, and do honour to the daisy, some to the flower, and some to the leaf. Afterwards this gentlewoman learneth, by one of these ladies, the meaning hereof, which is this: They which honour the flower, a thing fading with every blast, are such as look after beauty and worldly pleasure; but they that honour the leaf, which abideth with the root, notwithstanding the frosts and winter storms, are they which follow virtue and during qualities, without regard of worldly respects._" Some farther allegory was perhaps implied in this poem. Froissart, and other French poets, had established a sort of romantic devotion to the _marguerite_, or daisy, probably because the homage was capable of being allegorically transferred to any distinguished lady bearing that name. Chaucer might obliquely insinuate the superior valour of the warriors, and virtue of the ladies of Albion, by proposing to them the worship of the laurel, as a more worthy object of devotion than the flower. Nor is this interpretation absolutely disproved by the homage which Chaucer himself pays to the daisy in the Legend of Alcestis.[194] A poet is no more obliged to be consistent in his mythological creed, than constant in his devotion to one beauty, and may shift from the Grecian to the Gothic creed, or from the worship of Venus to that of Bellona. If every separate poem is consistent with itself, it would be hard to require any further uniformity.