How thyngke ȝe now, sorys, ther-by?
Line 448
I trow ther be iij or iiij or moo;
And thys women that wepe so sorowfully
Whan that hyr chyldryn dey them froo,
As nater woll, [Woll repeated twice in MS.] and kynd.
Line 452
Yt ys but folly, I may wyll awooe,
To groche a-ȝens god or to greve ȝow,
For ȝe schall neuer se hym myschevyd, wyll I knowe,
Be lond nor watyr, haue thys in mynd.
Line 456
And groche not a-ȝens owr lord god,
In welthe or woo, wether that he ȝow send,
Thow ȝe be neuer so hard be-stad,
For whan he wyll he may yt a-mend.
Line 460
Hys comawmentes treuly yf ȝe kepe with goo[d] hart,
As thys story hath now schowyd ȝow before,
And feytheffully serve hym qwyll ȝe be qvart, [Quart, active, hearty, in good condition.]
That ȝe may plece god bothe euyn and morne.
Line 464
Now Jesu, that weryt the crown of thorne,
Bryng vs all to heuyn blysse!
Finis.
THE FIFTEEN SIGNS BEFORE DOOMSDAY.
IN the first century after Christ the expectation of the last day gave rise to descriptions of the signs which should betoken it, shaped by fervent imagination, not only upon our Lord's predictions in Luke xxi. 9—11; Math. xiv. 7 and xxiv. 29; Mark xiii. 24, but also on other passages, as Ezekiel xxxii. 7, 8; Joel ii. 10, 32; Isa. xiii. 9, 10, and xxxiv. 4, and others. The apocryphal fourth book of Ezra, Bishop Hippolytus, Lactantius, Eusebius, Jerome, and Augustine, one after the other, took up the legend,—increased, defined, or modified it.
