"The Canterbury Tales" by Geoffrey Chaucer, The Monk's Tale

In Tragic Manner I will now lament
The griefs of those who stood in high degree
And fell at last with no expedient
To bring them out of their adversity.

Long ere his birth, by an annunciation,
Samson was heralded by an angel bright
Who marked him out for God in consecration.

This Samson never drank of mead or wine,
His head no razor ever touched, or shear;
This precept was enjoined by the divine
Messenger-angel—all his strength lay here,
Lodged in his locks.

You are a rebel before God, his foe,
Having defiled his vessels of pure gold;
Your wife and all your wenches have made bold
To do the like and drink of many a wine
In honour of false gods

Even the friends he has will not endure,
For if good fortune makes your friends for you
Ill fortune makes them enemies for sure,
A proverb very trite and very true.

She was a wrestler and could win a fight
Against a stripling of whatever might

And she had kept her maiden honour bright,
Not deigning to be vanquished or subdued.

she never would consent
To let him lie with her, except it be
Once only, when it was her clear intent
To have a child, to leave posterity

Great Bernabo Visconti of Milan,
God of indulgence, scourge of Lombardy,
Should I not tell of thee, unhappy man

Thus, mighty once, he met his end in jail;
Fortune foreclosed on his estate and carved
His greatness from him.

And his embroidered garments, heap on heap,
Blazed with them richly; gems were his delight.
A prouder, more fastidious ostentation
Of pomp no emperor has ever shown

And his embroidered garments, heap on heap,
Blazed with them richly; gems were his delight.
A prouder, more fastidious ostentation
Of pomp no emperor has ever shown

And for a while he mastered him, succeeding
In putting his intelligence to use
With suppleness and wisdom.

And then he saw that of his own perdition
He was sole author and he fled away.

There never was a captain served a king
Who brought so many countries in subjection
Or one more famous then for everything
Touching the fields of war and insurrection,
Or more presumptuous by predilection
Than Holofernes.

There never was a captain served a king
Who brought so many countries in subjection
Or one more famous then for everything
Touching the fields of war and insurrection,
Or more presumptuous by predilection
Than Holofernes.

He made his enemies renounce their faith:
‘Nebuchadnezzar is your God,’ said he,
‘You shall adore none other that may be!’

What need to tell of King Antiochus
Or to describe his royal panoply,
His overweening pride, his venomous
Ill-doing?

The vengeance of the Lord smote cruelly;
Pestilent worms within his body crept
So that he stank, and stank so horribly,
Not one of all the servants that he kept
To guard him when awake or when he slept
Could bear the stench or look upon his features.

To all his host and to himself no less
The carrion stench that rose from every vent
Was unendurable in loathsomeness

In redolent
And agonizing pain within his tent
Upon a hill this thief and homicide
Who made so many suffer and lament
Wretchedly perished, the reward of pride.

Ah, help me to speak shame
Of poisoners and of the foul rebuff
Of fickle Fortune, whom alone I blame.

he felt so vain
He set himself to vengeance and derision.

‘This tree,’ she told him, ‘signifies a gibbet
And Jupiter betokens snow and rain,
While Phoebus with his towel must exhibit
The streaming sun, to dry you off again.
You will be hanged, my father, that is plain;
The rain shall wash you and the sun shall bake.’

Tragedy is no other kind of thing
Nor tunes her song save only to bewail
How Fortune, ever fickle, will assail
With sudden stroke the kingdoms of the proud