In the merry month of May,
In a morn by break of day,
With a troop of damsels playing
Forth I rode, forsooth, a-maying,
When anon by a woodside,
Where as May was in his pride,
I espièd, all alone,
Phillida and Corydon.
Much ado there was, God wot!
He would love and she would not:
She said, “Never man was true...
I Would I were an excellent divine,
That had the Bible at my fingers’ ends;
That men might hear out of this mouth of mine
How God doth make his enemies his friends;
Rather than with a thundering and long prayer
Be led into presumption, or despair.
This would I be, and would none other be,
But a religious servant of my God;...
