Englands Parnassus: or the choysest flowers of our moderne poets, with their poeticall comparisons Descriptions of bewties, personages, castles, pallaces, mountaines, groues, seas, springs, riuers, &c. Whereunto are annexed other various discourses, both pleasaunt and profitable.

Auarice.

— Greedie Auarice by him did ride, Vpon a Camell loaden all with gold, Two iron coffers hung on either side, With precious mettall, full as they might hold: And in his lap a heape of coyne he tolde, For of his wicked pelfe his god he made, And vnto hell, himselfe for money solde Accursed vsurie was all his trade, And right and wrong alike in equall ballance waied. Ed. Spencer.

Forth of a Desart wood an vgly beast There seem'd to come, whose shape was thus defined, Eares of an Asse, a Wolfe in head and breast, A carkasse all with pinching famine pined, A Lyons grisly iawe, but all the rest To fox-like shape did seeme to be enclined, In England, France, in Italy and Spaeine, Yea all the world this monster seem'd to raine, Where ere this cruell monster set his foote, He kild and spoyld of euery sort and state: No height of birth or state with him did boote He conquered Kings and crownes all in like rate. Yea this beasts power had tane so deep a roote,

It entred in Christs Vicars sacred gate, And vexed Cardinalls and Bishops chiefe, And bred a scandall euen in our beliefe. S. I. Harr.

Python whom Phoebus kil'd with thousand darts, Was monster lesse then this by thousand parts. Idem.

Eriphilaes Armor. In vaine it were for to declare in Verse, How sumptuously her armour all was wrought, All set with stones, and set with Indian Gold, Perfect for vse, and pleasant to behold. Mounted she was, but not vpon a steede, In stead whereof, she on a Wolfe did sit: A Wolfe whose match Apulia doth not breede, Taught to obey, although she vs'de no bit. And all of sandy colour was her weede, Her armes were this, for such a Champion fit, An vgly toade was painted on her shield, With poyson swolne, and in a sable field. Idem.

—Auarice, all arm'd in hooking ••enters, All clad in birdlime, without bridge she venters, Through fell Charibdis and false Syrtes Nesse, The more her wealth, the more her wretchednesse, Cruell, respectlesse, friendlesse, faithlesse else, Those foule base figures in each dunghill poole, Like Tantalus staru'd in the midst of store, Not that she hath, but what she wants she counts, A well-wing'd Bird, that neuer loftie mounts. I. Syluister. Transl.

Regard of worldly mucke doth fowly blend, And lowe abase the hie heroike spirit, That ioyes for crownes and kingdomes to contend. Ed. Spencer.

We aged carke to liue, and leaue an ouerplus in store, Perhaps for spend-alls: so amidst abundance liue we pore. W. Warner.

Those which much couet, are with gaine so fond, That what they haue not that which they possesse: They scatter and vnloose from their bond. And so by hoping more, they haue but lesse, Or gaining more, the profit of excesse Is but to surfet, and such griefes sustaine, That they proue banckrout in this pore rich vaine. VV. Shakespeare.

Those that will all deuour, must all forgoe. Tho. Dekkar.

Cōtent thee with vnthreatned mean, & play not Aesops dog The gold that gētle Bacchus gaue, did greedy Mydas clog: Commit not treasure with thy child to greedy minded men, Thou leauest Polydor a spoile to Polymnestor then. VV. ƲƲarner.